When did trains first start in Europe?

Did you know that the first train ride on the European mainland took place in Belgium? On 5 May 1835 the very first train to travel on the European mainland departed from Brussels. It's was heading for Mechelen, 22 km away. Despite ceremoniously opening the railway track, King Leopold I was not allowed to climb aboard.



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The first rail lines in most of western Europe were in existence by 1835, but at that time Germany was still quite rural in settlement and development patterns.

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The Middleton Railway is known as the oldest working railway, excluding cable systems. It was built in 1758 in Leeds in West Yorkshire, an upland county in England. Originally, it was constructed from wooden tracks but by 1799 employed iron edge rails.

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When Britain declared war on Germany in 1914, trains efficiently moved huge numbers of troops and equipment between the Home Front and France. Trains also transported rations, water and coal across Britain and continental Europe in a way not previously possible during conflict.

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The Middleton Railway in Leeds, which was built in 1758, later became the world's oldest operational railway (other than funiculars), albeit now in an upgraded form. In 1764, the first railway in America was built in Lewiston, New York.

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The “golden age” of rail travel in America was the period between 1900 and the late 1940's. During those years, most travel was done by train and some of it in luxury.

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The Middleton Railway is the world's oldest continuously working railway, situated in the English city of Leeds. It was founded in 1758 and is now a heritage railway, run by volunteers from The Middleton Railway Trust Ltd. since 1960. Main station building on Moor Road.

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Early developments. The earliest railway in Britain was a wagonway system; a horse drawn wooden rail system, used by German miners at Caldbeck, Cumbria, England, perhaps from the 1560s. A wagonway was built at Prescot, near Liverpool, sometime around 1600, possibly as early as 1594.

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The first full-scale working railway steam locomotive was built in the United Kingdom in 1804 by Richard Trevithick, a British engineer born in Cornwall. This used high-pressure steam to drive the engine by one power stroke.

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World Metro System Facts
  • THE world's first metro, now the world's oldest system, is the London Underground in England, which is more commonly known as the Tube, which was opened in 1863. ...
  • THE world's longest metro system is the Shanghai Metro in China at 434 kilometers long.


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THE world's first metro, now the world's oldest system, is the London Underground in England, which is more commonly known as the Tube, which was opened in 1863. At 402 kilometers in length the London Underground is also the world's second longest metro system.

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The railroad was first developed in Great Britain. A man named George Stephenson successfully applied the steam technology of the day and created the world's first successful locomotive.

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Branchville, located on the southern tip of Orangeburg County, is home to the world's oldest railroad junction. The junction was built in 1828 and ran from Charleston to Branchville and was on the route of the country's first scheduled train.

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The author was just one of the thousands of people who flocked to the Transcontinental Railroad beginning in 1869. The railroad, which stretched nearly 2,000 miles between Iowa, Nebraska and California, reduced travel time across the West from about six months by wagon or 25 days by stagecoach to just four days.

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In 1802, Richard Trevithick patented a high pressure engine and created the first steam-powered locomotive engine on rails.

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One of the most frequently asked questions we receive when conducting training on railroading basics is: “Who owns the railroad tracks?” In the United States and Canada, that answer is overwhelmingly the railroads themselves.

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