Metre-Gauge railways in Provence - the Central Var Line

Our survey of the Central Var Metre-Gauge Line continues with the length from Seillans to Claviers ....

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The journey along the Central Var metre-gauge line continues from Claviers to Figanieres.

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In this next post we reach Draguignan which very quickly became the premier town on the Nice to Meyrargues line.

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Now from Draguignan to Lorgues .....

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The journey along the Central Var Metre-Gauge line between Nice and Meyrargues continues with the length from Lorgues to Sillans-la-Cascade:

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The next length of the Central Var line runs from Sillans-la-Cascade to Barjols:

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And now from Barjols to Rians

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And the final length from Rians to Meyrargues

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It only now remains to look at locomotives and rolling stock on the line.

The first of these covers the steam traction on the line:

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And the second covers Diesel power on the Chemin de Fer du Sud Central Var Line in the years before closure in 1950.

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This is the final post about the Chemin de Fer du Sud de la France Central Var Line and it covers the rolling stock (wagons and coaches) which were found on the line.

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Hello,

As I have already mentioned, I am pondering converting my blog into an online book. This might prove of interest to people. I have taken this a little further and produced the first few chapters of the book I am imagining. They are at the moment missing a contents page and and editorial page but I'd appreciate comments on whether the book might be worth publishing on line and whether you think it should be free or charged for?

If you are interested, please follow this link via my blog:

https://rogerfarnworth.wordpress.com/20 ... la-france/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Best wishes

Roger

In November 2018, my wife and I visited a number of the perched villages in the area around Fayence. As a result, I have updated one or two posts on my blog which relate to parts of the Central Var metre-gauge line. The changes to the post below relate to a visit to the perched village of Tanneron which sits high in the hills above the line. The village is a staggering 11 kilometres from the old station which bore its name.

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On the same journey on 15th November 2018, Jo and I were also fortunate enough to follow the line of the D94 linking Tanneron to the site of its station, and then to travel along the D562 and the Avenue de Narbonne before visiting the village of Montauroux The result of these visits has been some minor additions to the post below, particularly some photographs.

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I am sure there is no future for "Metre gauge railways". They were a feature of an increasingly distant past. A few still continue but most have been discontinued. I have made a lot of use of the metre gauge system in East Africa, and have found them quite useful, but the trend even there is to replace them with Standard gauge lines, as can be seen in Kenya. The new standard gauge lines will have greater capacity and faster line speed, which will be very useful. The metre gauge trains needed sleeping cars for the higher classes, but the faster SG trains will not need them.

When they were built in Europe the aim was to spend less on investment in areas of low demand. The same was true of Africa and other colonial areas. The decision was made to spend less, but in retrospect we can see that this was an unfortunate policy. In Europe the early lines did not have to face road competition but their slower speeds put them at a disadvantage nowadays. In Europe the metre gauge lines were built in areas which had less demand for transport. In almost all cases the development of efficient road vehicles has rendered them uncompetitive. Most of the lines you are describing here are distant memories.