We looked at this line about a year ago, but the amount of snow made another video worthwhile. This is our 11th video from France. See the others here: [ Ссылка ]
Link to the continuation to Marseille: [ Ссылка ]

We will be travelling from France's highest city - Briançon with its train station at 1'203 meters above sea level to the junction Veynes-Dévoluy. From there you can continue to Marseille to the south, Grenoble to the north or Valence to the west.

As most lines in France, this line has an interesting story. Probably the most interesting part for me, was discovering that 16 Km of the original line is now underwater. Due to a history of disastrous flooding, construction began in 1955 of what would then be Europe's largest dam to help regulate the water flow, further enable irrigation and bring hydro-electric power opportunities. In 1956, construction began of a new track section between Chorges and Embrun. It was opened in 1960, as the old line was submerged along with 2 stations, 4 tunnels and 2 notable viaducts. During maintenance of the dam every 10 years, the old line once again becomes visible.
What is even more interesting is a branch line that was planned to leave the line near Chorges and connect to Barcelonnette. Construction commenced in 1909 and in anticipation of the dam, elaborate measures were taken to ensure the line would not be hampered by the then anticipated 50 to 80 meters of water. Many structures were completed including about 6 Km of tunnels, a 300m S shaped viaduct and a 680m viaduct crossing the Durance and what was to become the "Lac de Serre-Ponçon" dam. Inevitably works were hampered by the wars and the project ended up being abandoned as the dam was to hold much more water than originally planned, however many of the structures still exist today.

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