Train Stockyard in Tripoli
2011
Rail transport in Lebanon began in the 1890s and continued for most of the twentieth century, but has ceased as a result of the country's political difficulties.
The first railway in Lebanon was built while Lebanon was part of the Ottoman Empire, with the French-established Société des Chemins de fer Ottomans économiques de Beyrouth-Damas-Hauran being granted a concession in 1891. This railway was intended to link Beirut and the Damascus, providing Damascus with port access. A contemporary British plan to link Damascus with Jaffa was seen as a threat to Beirut's status the primary port of the northern Levant, and the French project was largely in response to this. The line, built to a 1,050 mm gauge across mountainous terrain, opened in 1895. At around the same time, a line from Riyaq to Aleppo via eastern Lebanon's Beqaa Valley was approved. Although it was intended to provide service between Damascus and Aleppo, it was built to standard gauge, and as such, traffic between those two cities needed to change trains at Riyaq. In the north, the city of Tripoli was also connected to Homs (now in Syria)
These lines continued to operate after the French replaced the Ottomans as the ruling power, and in World War II, the railways saw significant military use. Under British direction, the coastal line was linked to Haifa and extended to Tripoli, all in standard gauge — this meant that it was now theoretically possible to travel from Europe to Africa without changing trains. When Lebanon obtained its independence, the parts of this rail system which were within its territory came into state control, eventually being placed organised as Chemin de Fer de l'Etat Libanais (CEL). The Lebanese Civil War caused considerable damage to the rail network, however, and services gradually ceased — the last regular rail operations in Lebanon were trains carrying cement from Chekka to Beirut in 1997. (Source: Wikipedia)