The story begins two years before the opening of the Swiss Northern Railway. In 1845 a delegation travelled from Zürich to Baden to promote a concession for a railway from Basel to Waldshut. This would allow a connection towards Zürich. The line would cross the Aar river in Döttingen. It was proposed that the line would form an access route to a railway through the Splügen Pass or the Lukmanier Pass. In Zurich, however, a railway through the Gotthard Pass was favoured. Yet in 1847 a project to build a Lukmanier railway was approved, under an agreement for the purpose of establishing a Lukmanier Railway Company. A bridge at Koblenz was well placed for such a railway. But after 1861, the NOB also supported the Gotthard project, while the Splügen project was filed away.