1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Semmering Pass

SEMMERING PASS, the lowest of all the great passes across the Alps. The hospice, near the summit, was founded about 1160, but the pass was certainly used used at a much earlier date. Between 1848 and 1854 a railway line (the first in any sense to cross the Alps) was constructed, but passes 282 ft. below the summit of the pass (3225 ft.) by a tunnel about 1 m. long. The line runs from Wiener Neustadt (301/2 m. from Vienna) past Bruck to Graz (139 m. from Vienna), the capital of Styria, whence it is 227 m. by rail to Trieste.