Tranvía de Granada a Sierra Nevada
Railway · Granada
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Trams on 750 mm gauge track climbed the Genil out of Granada towards the Sierra Nevada from 1925 until 1974, 21.7 km of line whose last stretch to Barranco de San Juan opened only in 1956. The trackbed survives as the Via Verde de Sierra Nevada, a walking and cycling greenway that runs past old tram stations now serving as restaurants.
The line was the project of Julio Quesada Canaveral y Piedrola, Duke of San Pedro de Galatino, whose company built a private hydroelectric plant on the Maitena river to power it. A planned funicular extension up into the Sierra Nevada ski slopes was never built, leaving Barranco de San Juan as the line's final terminus. The Canales reservoir, built to supply Granada with water, later flooded part of the old alignment and forced the railway's closure in 1974. Its trackbed is now the Via Verde de Sierra Nevada, a walking and cycling greenway through Guejar Sierra that follows the Genil river past old tram stations converted into restaurants.
What you see
Between Pinos Genil and Maitena the old trackbed threads fourteen tunnels and crosses twenty bridges along the Genil gorge.
Practical
The stretch between Guejar Sierra and the old Maitena station, about six kilometers with four bridges and six tunnels, is rideable today as an easy greenway trail on foot or by bike.
rail trailhistorygreenway