See also Karawanken Tunnel (railway)

Karawanken Tunnel (railway)

The Karawanken Tunnel is the fourth longest railway tunnel in Austria and the longest in Slovenia with a length of . The railway passes under the Rožca saddle between Rosenbach in southern Austria and Jesenice in northern Slovenia...

The Karawanken Tunnel is a motorway

Controlled-access highway

A controlled-access highway is a highway designed exclusively for high-speed vehicular traffic, with all traffic flow and ingress/egress regulated...

 tunnel crossing the Alpine Karavanke mountain range between Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

 and Slovenia

Slovenia

Slovenia , officially the Republic of Slovenia , is a country in Central and Southeastern Europe touching the Alps and bordering the Mediterranean. Slovenia borders Italy to the west, Croatia to the south and east, Hungary to the northeast, and Austria to the north, and also has a small portion of...

, with a total length of 7864 m (25,800.5 ft), 8019 m (26,309.1 ft) enclosure between the portals.
Its construction began in 1986 and it opened on June 1, 1991. It connects the Austrian Karawanken Autobahn

Karawanken Autobahn

The Karawanken Autobahn is an autobahn in Austria. It runs about from the Villach junction with the Süd Autobahn and the Tauern Autobahn southwards to the Slovenian border where it connects the A2 motorway leading to Ljubljana...

 (A11) from Villach

Villach

Villach is the second largest city in the Carinthia state in the southern Austria, at the Drava River and represents an important traffic junction for Austria and the whole Alpe-Adria region. , the population is 58,480.-History:...

 with the A2 motorway

A2 motorway (Slovenia)

The A2 motorway is a motorway in Slovenia, around 175 km long, connecting Karavanke Tunnel via the capital city Ljubljana to Obrežje . It connects several larger Slovenian cities, including Kranj, Ljubljana and Novo Mesto, and is part of the Pan-European corridor X.The motorway was completed...

 leading to Kranj

Kranj

' is the third largest municipality and fourth largest city in Slovenia, with a population of 54,500 . It is located approximately 20 km north-west of Ljubljana...

 and Ljubljana

Ljubljana

Ljubljana is the capital of Slovenia and its largest city. It is the centre of the City Municipality of Ljubljana. It is located in the centre of the country in the Ljubljana Basin, and is a mid-sized city of some 270,000 inhabitants...

 in Slovenia, decongesting the historic Loibl/Ljubelj

Loibl Pass

The Loibl Pass or Ljubelj Pass is a high mountain pass in the Karavanke chain of the Southern Limestone Alps, linking Austria with Slovenia...

 and Wurzen/Korensko sedlo mountain passes.
In the late 1970s it was planned as a two-tube tunnel, (one two-lane tube for each direction), but lower than expected levels of traffic have meant that it has remained a single tube, single lane, two-way tunnel. The tunnel was built between 1987 and 1991 by the Tauern Autobahn

Tauern Autobahn

The Tauern Autobahn is an autobahn in Austria. It starts at the Salzburg junction with the Westautobahn , runs southwards, crosses the Tauern mountain range of the Central Eastern Alps and leads to the Süd Autobahn and Karawanken Autobahn at Villach in Carinthia...

 stock company at the behest of the Federal Republic of Austria, represented by the State of Carinthia

Carinthia (state)

Carinthia is the southernmost Austrian state or Land. Situated within the Eastern Alps it is chiefly noted for its mountains and lakes.The main language is German. Its regional dialects belong to the Southern Austro-Bavarian group...

. At its opening it was one of the best equipped tunnels with safety and surveillance

Surveillance

Surveillance is the monitoring of the behavior, activities, or other changing information, usually of people. It is sometimes done in a surreptitious manner...

 systems: emergency phones

Emergency telephone

An emergency telephone is a phone specifically provided for making calls to emergency services and is most often found in a place of special danger or where it is likely that there will only be a need to make emergency calls....

, fire detectors

Smoke detector

A smoke detector is a device that detects smoke, typically as an indicator of fire. Commercial, industrial, and mass residential devices issue a signal to a fire alarm system, while household detectors, known as smoke alarms, generally issue a local audible and/or visual alarm from the detector...

, video surveillance

Closed-circuit television

Closed-circuit television is the use of video cameras to transmit a signal to a specific place, on a limited set of monitors....

, traffic signalling

Traffic light

Traffic lights, which may also be known as stoplights, traffic lamps, traffic signals, signal lights, robots or semaphore, are signalling devices positioned at road intersections, pedestrian crossings and other locations to control competing flows of traffic...

, radio and phone connections, air circulation monitoring and carbon monoxide

Carbon monoxide

Carbon monoxide , also called carbonous oxide, is a colorless, odorless, and tasteless gas that is slightly lighter than air. It is highly toxic to humans and animals in higher quantities, although it is also produced in normal animal metabolism in low quantities, and is thought to have some normal...

 sensors.

Less than a month after its opening, in late June 1991, the Slovene terminus of the tunnel and its border post at Jesenice were briefly seized by an armored detachment of the Yugoslav People's Army

Yugoslav People's Army

The Yugoslav People's Army , also referred to as the Yugoslav National Army , was the military of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.-Origins:The origins of the JNA can...

 during the Ten-Day War

Ten-Day War

The Ten-Day War or the Slovenian Independence War was a military conflict between the Slovenian Territorial Defence and the Yugoslav People's Army in 1991 following Slovenia's declaration of independence.-Background:...

. The site witnessed brief but intense fighting, which included the ferrying of reinforcements to the Yugoslav troops by helicopter and culminated in an ineffectual airstrike by the Yugoslav air force. The border checkpoint building was heavily damaged in the crossfire.

Driving on Austrian as well as on Slovenian motorways requires a vignette

Vignette (road tax)

A road tax vignette is a form of tax on vehicles, used in several non-English speaking European countries. The term is of French origin, and is now used throughout Central Europe....

. Additionally, a toll (currently 6,50 euro

Euro

The euro is the official currency of the eurozone: 17 of the 27 member states of the European Union. It is also the currency used by the Institutions of the European Union. The eurozone consists of Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg,...

s for vehicles up to 3.5 tons) is imposed on drivers for using the tunnel. Since Slovenia has joined the Schengen Area

Schengen Area

The Schengen Area comprises the territories of twenty-five European countries that have implemented the Schengen Agreement signed in the town of Schengen, Luxembourg, in 1985...

 by the end of 2007, border controls have been abolished. Due to increasing traffic volume especially after the completion of the second tube of the Tauern Road Tunnel

Tauern Road Tunnel

The Tauern Road Tunnel is located in the Austrian federal state of Salzburg in Austria on the Tauern Autobahn north - south connection between Germany and Italy and Slovenia. This is a toll road. Since October 2007, the toll has been 12 euros per car and journey...

 in June 2011, congestions crop up especially on weekends in the summer season and have led to the resumption of plans to build a second tube.

See also

• List of tunnels in Austria
• List of tunnels in the Alps
• Autobahns of Austria
  Autobahns of Austria
  The Austrian autobahns are controlled-access highways in Austria. They are officially called Bundesstraßen A according to the Austrian federal road act...
  
  
• Highways in Slovenia
  Highways in Slovenia
  The highways in Slovenia are the central state roads in Slovenia and are divided into motorways and expressways . Motorways are dual carriageways with a speed limit of . They have white-on-green road signs as in Italy, Croatia and other countries nearby. Expressways are secondary roads, also dual...