The Balloon Locomotive

     Due to its weight, a train requires a low gradient, which normally means cuttings and switchbacks in mountainous terrain. However, reaching the top of  mountain is another matter, since removing removing the summit is not an option, and one of the ways of scaling such steep inclines is a funicular. Almost most of you will have heard the term, but how many know what it really means? It is essentially two trains operated on the counterbalance system. The ascending and descending lines form a loop, and the two trains are linked by a continuous cable. As one train goes down, its weight pulls the other one up. Sometimes, at the top, water is added to the descending train to increase the weight. Of course, the locomotive must still be powered - there is no such thing as a perpetual motion machine - but gravity significantly reduces the power bill.
     However, in late 1897, in the Austrian Alps, a single rail line was introduced driven, not by steam or electricity, but by a balloon!
     I have been unable to discover when this peculiar system ceased operation, but it appears to have begun in the final months of 1897, because an article in September of that year describes it as a proposal, and one in December indicates that it was running. For a full description, I shall quote from a magazine published in July 1898.

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...this most marvellous railroad, which goes to and from the summit of Hochstauffen Mountain at Bad-Reichenhall, the well-known watering-place in the Austrian Alps. The Aerostatic Railway - to give it its correct designation - owes its inception to the well-known inventor, Herr Volderauer, who had long ago convinced the experts that his scheme was perfectly feasible and safe. A single rail guides the cars, and keeps the balloon with its load captive, the cars gripping the rail at the sides and underneath the flange. At about every 15ft. [4½ metres] the line is firmly anchored. In descending the mountain, of course, gravity is the propelling force, water-ballast being taken aboard at the upper end to counterbalance the buoyancy of the balloon. The cock on the water-tank of the car can be opened by the operator at any time. The tank carries about 800lb. [364 kg] of water, and tank and car together weigh about 600lb [273 kg] . The balloon is 67ft. [20½ m] in diameter, and exerts a lifting capacity of something over 11,000lb. [The Times article says 10,560 lb or 4,800 kg.] Weights, also, can be taken aboard and discharged at the various stations along the line. At the foot of the track are the gas-tank and generator. The summit of the Hochstauffen offers a sublime view, but before the advent of the Aerostatic Railway the climb was both long an tedious. It was only attempted by experienced mountaineers.

Reference: Salvattore Pannizzi, 'Mountain Railways', The Wide World Magazine vol. 1, no. 3 (July 1898), pp 294 -304 at 304.  Accessible to be read or downloaded here.