Yeongdong Line

A 2001 front view of the Yeongdong Line switchback, where trains zigzagged down the Taebaek Mountains to Dogye until a spiral tunnel replaced it in 2012.

The route

The Yeongdong Line is a single-track railway of about 193 km, run by Korail between Yeongju in North Gyeongsang Province and Gangneung on the east coast. Its oldest part is the Cheoram Line, opened in 1940 by the private Samcheok Railway from Mukho Port to Dogye to carry coal from the mines of the Taebaek Mountains. The inland section from Yeongju to Cheoram followed in 1955, and in 1963 these lines and the Gangwon Bukbu Line were joined under one name.

The hardest ground lay between Tongni and Dogye, where the railway has to drop 435 m, from around 680 m above sea level at Tongni to 245 m at Dogye. At first freight cars were hauled up on a cable while passengers left the train and walked up the mountain. In 1963 a new route opened with a switchback between Heungjeon and Nahanjeong: trains ran into a dead end, reversed and carried on down the slope in a Z shape. It was the only switchback railway in South Korea.

This film was made in 2001 on a Mugunghwa train heading down from Heungjeon towards Dogye. On 27 June 2012 the switchback closed, replaced by the Solan Tunnel, more than 16 km long, which winds in a spiral beneath Yeonhwasan and cut the trip between Dongbaeksan and Dogye from 36 to 16 minutes. Tongni, Simpo-ri, Heungjeon and Nahanjeong stations closed with it, and part of the old line is now used by High1 Choo Choo Park, a railway theme park at Simpo-ri.

What you will see

The video begins at Heungjeon, on the mountainside above Dogye. From here the train follows a short stretch of track cut into the slope down to Nahanjeong, about 1.5 km away and lower down, where it changes direction once more before the final run to Dogye.

On a switchback the track you have just come down and the track you are about to take lie one above the other on the same hillside. It is how a railway loses height on a mountain too steep to descend directly. The wooded slopes around the line belong to the Taebaek range, the long spine that runs down the east side of the Korean peninsula.

The last stretch follows the valley into Dogye-eup in Samcheok, a coal mining town. Its station opened in 1940 with the Cheoram Line, the first part of what became the Yeongdong Line, and today it is the first stop for trains coming out of the Solan Tunnel.

Riding it for real

Korail's Mugunghwa trains on the Yeongdong Line no longer use the switchback; they run through the Solan Tunnel between Dongbaeksan and Dogye. The old section can now be seen only from the tourist trains of High1 Choo Choo Park. When the park opened in 2014, its switchback train ran between Heungjeon, Nahanjeong and Dogye on a round trip of about 100 minutes.

The Yeongdong Line itself remains in use from Yeongju through the mountains to Cheoram and Dogye, then along the coast past Donghae and Jeongdongjin to Gangneung. Check Korail and High1 Choo Choo Park for current timetables and fares before you travel.

The video is embedded from YouTube and remains on its owner’s channel. Views count toward the original video.