ALONG THE LINE RUNS THE TRAIN

• Amarí Peliowski (Toronto, Canada, 1980) is an architect and Doctor of Art History. She works as a researcher, teacher, and curator. She is currently an academic and Deputy Director of Instituto de Arquitectura y Urbanismo de la Facultad de Arquitectura y Urbanismo de la Universidad de Chile. Her research topics are related to the social and visual history of architecture and the city. She has been an academic scholar and responsible for research and cultural dissemination projects, and has published books, book chapters and articles in Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Spain, France and the United Kingdom.
• José de Nordenflycht (Viña del Mar, Chile, 1970) is an Art Historian, and holds a Bachelors and Masters degree in History from Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso (PUCV), and is a Doctor of Art History from Universidad de Granada. He is a Tenured Professor and Director of Departamento de Artes Integradas de la Universidad de Playa Ancha, and Adjunct Professor at Escuela de Arquitectura de la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. He is a Corresponding Member of Academia Nacional de Bellas Artes de Argentina. He has been a curator of exhibitions, consultant for heritage projects, and lecturer in Chile and abroad. He is the author and co-author of dozens of books, including Monumentos y Sitios de Chile (1999), Patrimonio Local (2004), Post Patrimonio (2012), Patrimonial (2017), Estudios Patrimoniales (2019), and Variaciones Patrimoniales

About Empresa de los Ferrocarriles del Estado (EFE) 

In the  territories of Chile, we can follow the line of the  routs, which are outlined between locations, traversing  the country’s backbone. In just a few years, the train revolutionized the way territories were connected. What did it mean at every level? In 1851, Ferrocarril Caldera – Copiapó railway was inaugurated for mineral cargo transport -33 years before EFE existed- while in the rest of the country, people continued to travel on foot and by horse. The situation began to change when, in 1873, the  Congress authorized the State to acquire private shares, procurung the entire southern network of the country, including branch lines. At this moment, the political strategy concernig the railway ssystem began to take shape. History advanced at full steam. The railway system accompanied significant processes in the country, including rural-urban migration, cargo transport, the emergence of settlements, hotels, tourism, shipping companies, and football teams.

How did those generations, who lived in those early years of EFE, imagine the future of the company? If today we bet on commuter trains, back then the focus was on long-distance trains. In 1995, with services distributed among brances, Ferrocarriles de Pasajeros S.A. was established, currently EFE Central, covering the Santiago-Chillán network; in 2005, EFE Valparaíso began operating as the first urban train of EFE, then called Metro Valparaíso; in 2008, EFE Sur was founded, operating the Biotren passenger service.