1856 in rail transport

Events

January events

• January – Opening throughout of first railroad in Africa and the Middle East, from Alexandria to Cairo, Egypt.
• January 29 – The 223-mile North Carolina Railroad is completed from Goldsboro through Raleigh and Salisbury to Charlotte.

  March events

• March 23 or 26 – Cambridge Railroad street railway opens in Boston, giving the city the world's oldest continuously working streetcar system.

  April events

• April 19 – Death of American locomotive builder Thomas Rogers, following which his son, Jacob S. Rogers, reorganizes Rogers, Ketchum and Grosvenor as Rogers Locomotive and Machine Works.
• April 21 – The first railroad bridge across the Mississippi River opens between Rock Island, Illinois, and Davenport, Iowa.

  May events

• May 1 – First section of Bombay, Baroda and Central India Railway opens, between Ankleshwar and Utran.
• May 6 – The newly constructed sidewheeler Effie Afton runs into one of the supports for the first railroad bridge across the Mississippi River, causing a fire that destroys the bridge just two weeks after it had opened.

  June events

• June 21 – The Illinois Central Railroad opens its Great Central Station in Chicago.

  July events

• July 14 – The Rome and Frascati Rail Road opens for service.
• July 17 – The Great Train Wreck occurs near Philadelphia in the United States.

  September events

• September 16 – Tarragona–Reus line in Spain opens.
• September 21 – The Illinois Central Railroad connects Chicago to Cairo, Illinois, completing 700 miles of track to become the longest railway in the United States.
• September 22 – The Oriental Railway Company is granted the concession to build the first railway in Turkey, from İzmir to Aydın.

  October events

• October 23 – The line that is now Belgian railway line 161 is completed and opened connecting Brussels-North and Namur stations.
• October 28 – Opening of first railway in Portugal, from Lisbon to Carregado.

  December events

• December 1 – Opening of first steam-operated passenger railways in Sweden, from Gothenburg to Jonsered and Malmö to Lund.

  Births

February births

• February 2 – Frederick William Vanderbilt, director of the New York Central system.

  December births

• December 30 – Sam Fay, General manager of the Great Central Railway of England, 1902–1922.

  Deaths

January deaths

• January 8 – Charles "Joe" Baldwin, conductor on the Wilmington and Manchester Railroad

  March deaths

• March 11 – James Beatty, Irish engineer who was involved in building the European and North American Railway and the Grand Crimean Central Railway.

  April deaths

• April 19 – Thomas Rogers, American steam locomotive builder, dies in New York.
• April 20 – Robert L. Stevens, president of Camden and Amboy Railroad.

  November deaths

• November 1 - John Urpeth Rastrick, English steam locomotive builder and partner in Foster, Rastrick and Company.