Maputo Central Railway Station

마푸투 중앙역

A 1916 railway station with a verdigris dome and pale cream walls trimmed in green, often listed among the most beautiful stations in the world.

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At a glance

Country: Mozambique
Location: Maputo, Mozambique
Built: 1916
Type: Infrastructure

Quick answers

Where is Maputo Central Railway Station?

Maputo Central Railway Station is in Maputo, Mozambique.

When was Maputo Central Railway Station built?

Maputo Central Railway Station was built in 1916.

The Central Railway Station in Maputo, Mozambique, is a historic train station built between 1908 and 1916 in the Beaux-Arts style. It has pale walls and a green copper dome, and international magazines have ranked it among the most beautiful stations in the world.

It stands on the CFM Sul line, which is now closed and once linked to South Africa, Eswatini and Zimbabwe. The station is run by Mozambique Ports and Railways. Many people say that the famous engineer Gustave Eiffel designed it, but that is not true. The city used to be called Lourenço Marques, and the very first station here in 1895 was a modest building of wood and zinc. The globe shows the cream building with its green dome.

Who really designed it

The first plans came from the government architect Mario Veiga, with Alfredo Augusto Lisboa de Lima, and were inspired by the main station in Johannesburg, but with a grander facade. The dome was designed by José Ferreira da Costa and made by the Johannesburg firm Evans & Plows.

It was built in South Africa because World War I made it hard to order from Britain. Pietro Buffa Buccellato designed the decoration of the facade.

A long history

The old wooden station was opened in 1895 by Paul Kruger, President of the South African Republic. Plans for a new one began in 1904, and the government set aside 400,000 dollars in its 1906-1907 budget. The long metal platform opened on 19 March 1907 and the building was inaugurated on 19 March 1910.

Work resumed in 1913 on the facade and dome, and the station was finished in 1916. For its 100th birthday in 2010, a plaque was unveiled and President Armando Guebuza launched a campaign called 'Heritage is ours'. A railway museum opened inside in 2015.

What it looks like

The building is neoclassical Beaux-Arts. A tall arch in the center of the grand facade is topped by the largest of three domes. The copper-covered central dome brings the height to 51 metres, and two symmetrical sides link the main tower to the smaller domed towers through second-story verandas.

Marble pillars and wrought-iron latticework add decoration. Newsweek ranked it 7th among 'train stations as grand as the journey' in 2009 and called it probably the most beautiful terminus in Africa. It also appears in the 2006 film Blood Diamond.