This gallery groups together two physically separated sections of railway by covering the route from the Bulgarian frontier at Kappikule to Malatya that linked Ankara to Istanbul and Europe to the west; and formed a trunk route through Kayseri and Sivas to the east. Until nationalisation Oriental Railways operated the section in European Turkey westwards from Istanbul whilst on the other side of the Bosphorus, the Societe du Chemin de fer Ottoman d'Anatolie (CFOA) was floated in 1889 to continue construction of the line from Haydarpasa to Ankara onwards from Izmit. The line was fully opened on 31st December 1892 and in February 1893 the CFOA obtained a concession for a line from Ankara through Kayseri, Sivas, and Malatya to Baghdad although the section to Kayseri was only opened days before the TCDD formation and Malatya was not reached until 1937, many years after the line to Baghdad had been completed through Malatya via Konya and Adana.
By mid 2014 the majority of a high speed line between Istanbul and Ankara had been opened and work was in hand constructing a tunnel under the Bosphorus to connect the the European and Asian sections of the TCDD.

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