Introduction

This site covers the history of the railways, mostly narrow gauge, in the far south of South America and in the islands of the South Atlantic. Some of these were public lines ('common carriers' in US parlance) whilst many others were private industrial or agricultural systems.

It will surprise many to learn that this area contained at least sixty different railways and probably more. There is still much research to do, and any new information would be much appreciated. However, there is already much of interest, from 1500 ton coal trains on the 75cm. (2' 6") gauge, to gold mining and whaling railways! Details are also included of the museums and tourist railways in the area, including 'La Trochita' at Esquel and the 'End of the World' line at Ushuaia.

How to get around
This site is divided into fourteen main topics. Rollover the red number plates to see what is in each chapter. In each one there may be a number of separate pages, usually accessed by clicking somewhere on a button bar below the title.

English and Spanish
As well as this English language site, a Spanish version is available, thanks to the translation work of David Sinclair.

These pages are copyright Martin Coombs 1999 - 2026.
Some sections and photos may also be the copyright
of other helpers and contributors.

Our book
For several years little had been added to this site – not because we had lost interest but because all of our time and energy went into preparing a book on the subject. This was published in 2014.

'Railways at the End of the World –
in Patagonia and the South Atlantic Islands'

The book sold well, and is now out of print. However, A PDF of the whole volume is available but this is a very large file and will need to be sent via WeTransfer. It can be obtained by emailing Martin Coombs at martincoombs11 @ gmail.com (omit spaces). There is no charge.

Steam locomotive lists
Much recent effort has gone into creating a set of steam locomotive lists for Chile and other Latin American countries.

These can be accessed directly by licking on this blue text.

Updates
Whilst this website will remain available for the foreseeable future, it is now very old-fashioned and cannot easily be updated without a tremendous amount of time and effort. We have therefore decided that any updates and additions will be added in the form of PDF files accessed via a new page.

Click here for the updates page.

Please feel free to contact me at the address below, to correct my mistakes, to ask questions, or even to provide new facts or photos. Information for this site and its Spanish language counterpart has been provided by many different helpers from all over the world. The photo above, for example, is by Alan Crotty and was taken in 1988.

Martin Coombs
martincoombs11 @ gmail.com