NRLA information portal

The history of the New Rail Link through the Alps (NRLA) is documented on the website alptransit-portal.ch. The information and sources are presented chronologically and by theme (politics, society, planning and construction). The website is operated by the Swiss Federal Archives.

The website alptransit-portal.ch contains hundreds of documents, photographs, films and visualisations and a wealth of information on the NRLA. The sources have been placed in their historical context, starting with the first Gotthard rail line in 1882 and leading right up to the present day.

The Swiss Federal Archives hold some 4,500 dossiers on this subject. Many of the documents originate from the Federal Office of Transport (FOT). Over 150 documents that are still within their closure period under the Archiving Act were released by the FOT and other federal authorities for use on the new portal.

The FOT commissioned the Swiss Federal Archives to create the portal in 2015 in response to a recommendation made to it by the parliamentary NRLA supervisory delegation. The portal went live in May 2016 and will be successively expanded with new sources. It is intended to provide the general public and academic community with easy access to carefully structured information on the NRLA covering over 100 years of Swiss rail and construction history.