page_title: Rail transport in Lebanon
section_title: Ottoman Empire
hierarchical_section_title: Rail transport in Lebanon / History / Ottoman Empire
caption_attribution_description: English: Turkey in Asia (Asia Minor) and Transcaucasia. Keith Johnston's General Atlas. Oct. 1911. Engraved, Printed, and Published by W. &amp; A.K. Johnston, Limited, Edinburgh &amp; London
context_page_description: Rail transport in Lebanon began in the 1890s as French projects under the Ottoman Empire but largely ceased in the 1970s owing to the country's civil war. The last remaining routes ended for economic reasons in the 1990s. At its peak Lebanon had about 408 kilometres of railway.
context_section_description: Beirut and Damascus were first connected by telegraph in 1861 and by a macadam road in 1863. Syrian railways connecting the two cities (90 mi or 140 km over the crest of the Mount Lebanon range) or another port were planned as early as 1871 but were not enacted. In 1889, the Ammiyya Revolt broke out among the Druze and other Syrian farmers. The Ottoman response to the insurrection included a number of railway concessions—quickly sold to foreign interests—to improve the development and centralized control of the region.
  Hasan Beyhum Efendi received a concession to construct a tramway between Beirut and Damascus in 1891. Beyhum sold the concession later that year to the French Beirut–Damascus Tramway (French: Compagnie de la voie ferrée économique de Beyrouth–Damas) or Lebanon Railway, which was anxious to forestall two mooted British lines, one from Jaffa and another from Haifa, either of which would have undercut Beirut's status as the primary port of the northern Levant. In the event, the Jaffa line was never extended towards Damascus and the Haifa line ran out of money having completed just 8 km (5.0 mi) or 21 mi (34 km) of track.
  Around the same time, the French Damascus Tramways (Compagnie des tramways de Damas et voies ferrées économiques de Syrie) or Belgian Syrian Railway (Chemin de fer en Syrie) purchased another native's concession for the 65 mi (105 km) Damascus–Muzeirib Railway. The Hauran around Muzeirib is Syria's breadbasket and the town also served as the point of departure for pilgrim caravans during the Hajj.
  The two lines quickly merged as the Société des Chemins de fer Ottomans économiques de Beyrouth–Damas–Hauran or Société des chemins de fer ottomans economiques de Beyrouth–Havran, with its headquarters in Constantinople (Istanbul) and an office in Paris. It originally planned to use a meter gauge but ended with a 1,050 mm (3 ft 5 ¹¹⁄₃₂ in) gauge, along with expensive Abt rack sections to deal with the Mount Lebanon range. It ran through the Dar al-Beida Pass, with the summit at Beidar (37 km or 23 mi from Beirut) 1,487 m or 4,879 ft above sea level. The railway completed its port at Beirut in December 1892.
  In 1893, the company received a concession for a line from Damascus to Birecik in Anatolia, which prompted its name to be changed to the Damascus–Hama Railway or Damascus–Hama and Extensions (Société Ottomane du Chemins de fer de Damas-Hamah et Prolongements, DHP; Turkish: Şam–Hama ve Temdidi Osmanlı Demiryolu Şirketi). The network is also known as the Syrian Railways in English. The initial concession was later emended to link the two lines at Riyaq instead of Damascus. Service from Damascus south to Muzeirib began in July 1894 (in time for that year's harvest) and to Beirut on 3 August 1895. The trip from the coast to Damascus initially took 9 hours and terminated at three different stations: Baramke Station, Qanawat Station, and Midan Station. Between 1900 and 1908, the separate Hejaz Railway (HRR) expanded from Damascus south to Medina, with a branch to Haifa opened in 1906. The HRR was built to a 1.05-meter gauge to match the Beirut–Damascus Railway and absorbed both the former British concession and the DHP's line south from Damascus.)
  Wheat from the Hauran—high-protein semolina used in pasta—was intended to be the mainstay of the railway's income, along with the Muslim pilgrimage trade during the Hajj. The entry of American, Indian, and Australian wheat into the European market amid the continuing Long Depression, however, undercut that trade while the railway was still under construction. Damascene traders had thought the Beirut railway would allow them to export their grain more cheaply; instead, as early as the 1894 harvest, the rail flooded the market, collapsing prices and margins. Completion of the line to the coast did not improve matters, since the world market was trading at still lower prices and the premium once commanded by Hauran wheat—which, being hand-harvested, might include pebbles or weeds—was now lost to machine-reaped grain from the United States. It was not until 1908 
caption: A 1911 map of Turkey in Asia depicting the DHP's northward extension to Aleppo and the HRR's parallel track through the Hauran
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