Biography of Luigi Negrelli

ing. Luigi NegrelliLuigi Negrelli was born in Fiera di Primiero  (Trento) in 1799.  After studying engineering in Innsbruck, he devoted himself to the design and construction of the first Swiss railways and of Vienna-Prague-Bodenback rail net.

In 1848 he studied the railway network in North Italy and was appointed Head of Lombard-Veneto Kingdom High Direction of Railway and Telegraph Constructions.

In 1850 he presided over the Po navigation and in 1852 he was  member of the Middle Italy Railway Commission. In his long career he presides over many infrastructural works in between which are outstanding the following:

- An important set of road works in Pusteria and Adige Valleys;
- The rearrangement of the Rhein river Bed from Liechtenstein to the Lake of Constance;
- The Zurich constructions of roads, wharfs and the Műnster bridge on the river Limmat.

However, Luigi Negrelli is remembered mainly for the design of the Suez Canal that he started in 1838. His solution of a canal without locks was accepted by the International Commission established by Mohammed Sa’i Pascià, viceroy of Egypt, in 1856.

While F. de Lasseps was granted  the building licence by the Egyptian Counterpart, Negrelli was instead appointed chief inspector of works on third of the April of 1857, but he died in Wien on first of the October of 1958.