The Southern Railway () is a railway in Austria that runs from Vienna to Graz and the border with Slovenia at Spielfeld via Semmering and Bruck an der Mur. Along with the Spielfeld-Straß–Trieste railway (lying largely in Slovenia), it forms part of the Austrian Southern Railway that connected Vienna with Trieste, the main seaport of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, via Ljubljana. A main obstacle in its construction was getting over the Semmering Pass over the Northern Limestone Alps. The twin-track, electrified section that runs through the current territory of Austria is owned and operated by Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB) and is one of the major lines in the country. History 1829: Austrian railway pioneer Franz Xaver Riepl proposed a railway connection from Vienna to the Adriatic Sea, bypassing the Eastern Alps and running via Bruck an der Leitha, Magyaróvár and Szombathely (through the west edge of Hungary, avoiding the Alps), and then Maribor and Ljubljana to Trieste. His plans were adopted by entrepreneur Georgios Sinas. At the same time plans for a direct connection through the Alps were developed and promoted by Archduke John of Austria to open up the Styrian lands beyond Semmering Pass. 1836: Sinas had engineer Matthias von Schönerer build the first stretch of line from Vienna to Győr (Raab), Hungary with a branch-off to Bratislava. 1838: Sinas established the private Wien-Raaber Eisenbahn (WRB) company with 12.5 million florins of share capital. 1839: Departing from the original plans of a connection via Hungary, construction works started on the initial section which ran southwards between Baden, Lower Austria and Wiener Neustadt. Schönerer had travelled to the US, where he bought a used steam locomotive named Philadelphia, built by the Norris Locomotive Works in 1837. 16 May 1841. This section opened. Soon after, the railway was extended to Mödling and Neunkirchen. 1841: Ghega started to survey the terrain of the Semmering Pass. 5 May 1842: The line from Wien Südbahnhof (Southern Station) was completed to Gloggnitz at the northern foot of the Semmering Pass. Most goods traffic ran on the parallel Wiener Neustadt Canal (also leased by Sinas), but passenger figures continuously increased. 1844: Sinas had the construction of the railway to Hungary (the present-day Eastern Railway) resumed. 21 October 1844: South of the Semmering Pass, the line from Graz northward to Mürzzuschlag (decided on by the Austrian government) (led by engineer Carl Ritter von Ghega) opened. 2 June 1846: