Porto Passenger Station - June 16, 2025

 

Various passenger trains in Porto Station photos 1 to 9

by Don Janes

     Back in June my wife and I travelled to Portugal for a 7 day Douro River Cruise.  After spending 2 days in Lisbon, we headed north to Porto to begin our cruise.   When we returned to Porto we took a Hight Speed Train back to Lisbon.  Arriving at the large Porto station an hour or so early offered a great opportunity for train watching on the platform.  Unlike stations here in Canada, you are pretty much unrestricted as to where you could wonder around and take photos.  In the course of just a little over an hour I watched many trains come and go at very frequent intervals.  Most, but not all, were passenger trains, both self propelled and diesel powered.  There were a couple of short freight trains that came in and stopped at the station for whatever reason.  All the electric trains were powered by overhead wires.

    I was surprised at the diesel powered locomotives that headed up some of the passenger trains.  They looked quite old to me and sounded like they were either GE or ALCO powered.  The freight locomotives were electric and quite large for the small trains I saw them hauling.  Actually, on our trip south to Lisbon I saw very little freight traffic and what trains I did see were quite short and appeared to be hauling bulk commodities in either covered hoppers or open gondolas and hoppers. 

    I spent an enjoyable hour or so watching the never ending train traffic coming into and leaving the station.  Our high speed train ride back to Lisbon was very comfortable and smooth.  It also had a schedule of about half the time of a conventional train as we made limited stops along the way.  If you ever have the opportunity to visit the passenger station in Porto you will be amazed at the number of trains and people that pass through in a short period of time.

This locomotive appears to be some sort of M of W equipment

One of the freight locomotives that stopped at the station

This is a view of the Hight Speed train we rode from Porto to Lisbon