New Athos Cave Railway

New Athos Cave Railway
New Athos Cave Railway
	New Athos subway train, built in Moscow.
Overview
Owner	New Athos Cave
Locale	New Athos Abkhazia de-facto; Georgia de-jure;
Termini	Entrance gate; Hall Anakopea;
Stations	3
Service
Type	Metro
Rolling stock	3 trains
History
Opened	4 July 1975
Technical
Line length	1.291 km (0.802 mi)
Track gauge	914 mm (3 ft)
Operating speed	30 km/h (19 mph)
Cave Railway and the two national railway stations within the town: New Athos and Psyrtscha

New Athos Cave Railway (Abkhaz: Афон Ҿыц аҳаҧытә метро; Russian: Новоафонская пещерная железная дорога), also knowns as New Athos Subway, is an underground electric railroad serving the New Athos Cave, in the town of New Athos, Georgia (Abkhazia).

Overview

Opened in 1975, it has a length of 1.3 kilometres (0.81 mi) and three stations,two of the trains are Soviet built tourist trains and the third is a newly built Latvian Ep 563. Since 2014 this has been only train in use. One of the tourist trains was modernized in 2005 in Moscow and based at Zal Apsny station for doubling the Ep 563 train in case of malfunction. Another tourist train is based at the depot.

Route

The line is a single track and electrified narrow gauge railway. It starts at the entrance of the caves, nearby Psyrtscha station of the Abkhazian railway. From the Entrance Gate station, it reaches two cave halls: Apsny Hall (or Abkhazia) and Anakopea Hall. Apsny station serves to lead the tourists at the beginnings of the show cave, and Anakopea to bring them back to the entrance gate, at the end of the tour. The line counts a depot just before Entrance station, and a service tunnel between it and Apsny.^[1]

Station	Russian name	km	Notes
Entrance Gate	Входные Ворота (Vkhodnye Vorota)	0.00	Link to Abkhazian railway at the nearby station of Psyrtscha 43°05′26″N 40°48′36″E / 43.09065°N 40.810008°E / 43.09065; 40.810008
Hall Apsny (Abkhazia)	Зал Апсны (Zal Apsny)	1.00	43°05′59″N 40°48′40″E / 43.09959°N 40.81114°E / 43.09959; 40.81114
Hall Anakopea	Зал Анакопия (Zal Anakopiya)	1.29	43°06′07″N 40°48′41″E / 43.10184°N 40.81129°E / 43.10184; 40.81129