Montserrat Rack Railway - History

History

A line on this route was originally opened in 1892. Competition arrived in 1930, in the form of the Aeri de Montserrat, an aerial cable car that also carries passengers to the monastery. A narrow road also reaches the monastery. After poor financial results and an accident in 1953, the rack railway line was closed on May 12, 1957.

However over time the Aeri and road became unable to handle the increasing number of visitors to the monastery. After many years of planning, a program began to rebuild the rack railway in 2001, and the line re-opened in its modern form on June 6, 2003. In its first 12 months of operation, the Montserrat Rack Railway carried 462,964 passengers.

The heaviest traffic was in August 2003 with 63,692 passengers, and the lightest in February 2004 with 22,996 passengers.

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