History preserved in São João del Rei
Since September 2001, the Ferrovia Centro-Atlântica (FCA) has taken over management of theailroad complex at São João del Rei, Minas Gerais. The concession was granted by the Transportation Ministry on a temporary basis for a one-year period, until the National Land Transportation Agency was able to effectively regulate the sector. Under new administration, the museum was reopened, and the passenger train between São João del Rei and Tiradentes, which operated with only two locomotives, began to use four steam engines for the stretch.
The São João del Rei railroad complex, protected as a Heritage Site by the National Artistic and Historic Heritage Institute (IPHAN), contains the largest collection of preserved and original steam engines from a single manufacturer – Baldwin – and a single railroad – the Estrada de Ferro Oeste de Minas (EFOM).
POD NOS TRILHOS
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- O projeto de renovação de 560 km de vias da MRS
- Da expansão da Malha Norte às obras na Malha Paulista: os projetos da Rumo no setor ferroviário
- TIC Trens: o sonho começa a virar realidade
- SP nos Trilhos: os projetos ferroviários na carteira do estado
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The 4-4-0 Baldwin, from 1908, is completely original, except for the track sweep |
At this location there are some 15 Baldwin locomotives specially built for a Baldwin 0.76 m gauge track, of which only one has been stripped for parts. Six are in operating condition – two using firewood and four running on oil. The other eight locomotives are complete, but halted – seven in the rotunda, built in 1882, and one in a museum at the train station.
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Maintaining a Baldwin 4-6-0 (1912) that pulls the Tiradentes train |
The complex also shelters another three metric-gauge locomotives that used to work for the old Rede Sul Mineira: two Baldwins – one of them cut in half for demonstration purposes – and a German-made Schwartzkopff, as well as a number of wooden cars and even a funeral carriage, containing an urn for carrying coffins.
At the end of the 1980s, the, São João Del Rei complex received the visit of descendents of the Baldwin family. According to a report prepared by the railroad, the members of the Baldwin clan – which once was the U.S.’s largest manufacturer of locomotives before the diesel-electric engines were introduced, – had never previously seen a preserved group of so many of its engines.
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The only scrapped engine is this 2-8-0, from 1893 |
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