Our first railway was built by the Imperial Railroad Company, founded by the Visconde de Mauá, connecting the Port of Mauá, in Guanabara Bay, to Serra da Estrela, on the way to Petropolis.
It had a length of 14.5 km and a gauge of i m (1854). Soon after, others emerged in the Northeast, Recôncavo Baiano and, mainly, in São Paulo, to serve the coffee economy, then in poor development (Estrela do Café).
They were, in general, built or financed by English capital that aimed only at the satisfaction of their commercial interests, without the least amount of planning.
Between 1870 and 1920, we lived a true “Railways Era”, with an average growth rate of 6,000 km per decade. After 1920, with the advent of the automobile era, the railroads entered a stagnation phase, not having recovered until today.
Currently, Brazil is a country poor in railways, and these are irregularly distributed throughout the territory, as while the Southeast region concentrates almost half (47%) of the country's railways, the North and Midwest regions together concentrate only 8%.
Current situation
The country currently has 30,000 km of railways for traffic, which gives a railway density of 3.1 meters per km²; it is very small compared to the USA (150m/km²) and Argentina (15m/km²). Only 2,450 km are electrified. Railroads are poorly distributed and poorly located, with 52% located in the Southeast region.
At Malha Sul, privatized by América Latina Logística (ALL), binational, we have an excellent performance of the railways, with 15,628 km in length and load volume of 20.7 million tons. The products most transported by it are: grains, steel products, containers, water, wine, stone and cement.
Do not stop now... There's more after the advertising ;)
by Eliene Percília
Brazil School Team
Would you like to reference this text in a school or academic work? Look:
SCHOOL, Team Brazil. "Railway transport in Brazil"; Brazil School. Available in: https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/brasil/transporte-ferroviario-brasileiro.htm. Accessed on June 27, 2021.