Presidential train arrives in Faro 125 years later

The ceremonial train used by heads of state from 1910 onwards is to travel between Vila Real de Santo António and Faro on July 1st to mark the 125th anniversary of the arrival of the railway line to Faro.

The initiative is part of a series of trips planned by the National Railway Museum. The Algarve event is in collaboration with Faro and Vila Real de Santo António councils which have arranged celebrations to mark the first passenger train that arrived in Faro on July 1st 1889.

There will be an exhibition in Faro titled ‘Glimpses of the railway in the Algarve’ which brings together related photographs, objects and documents.

"When the train arrived in Faro there were four days of celebration with music and fairs with the main buildings and monuments in the city illuminated and the streets decorated," said Marco Lopes, Director of the Museu Municipal de Faro, who said the train arrived in Faro three decades after the inauguration of the first passenger railway in the country between Lisbon and Carregado.

The arrival of the railroad to the Algarve had a great social and economic impact on the region, as beforehand transport was by sea, rivers or by tracks to and from the area which at that time was virtually isolated.

In 1906 the town of Vila Real de Santo António benefitted from the extension of the line from Faro.

According to the National Railway Museum, the objective is that the presidential train, which stopped functioning as such in the 1970s, can be used as a tourist attraction.

Using an EU grant, the Railway Museum restored the six carriages between 2009 and 2013.

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