Research into the improvement of the public transportation system in the Metropolitan Region of Recife (RMR) began in the 1970s, through the Executive Group for Integration of Transport Policy (GEIPOT), with the purpose of defining a Metropolitan System of Urban Transport of Passengers and a Transport Master Plan.
As a result, GEIPOT concluded the projects “Collective Transport Studies (Transcol)” and “TRENSURB/RECIFE”. The latter was part of the recovery policy of the Urban Passenger Rail System, as well as the implementation of the Metropolitan Train. Its objective was to function as a modern mass transit system on a fixed track, to be deployed in the railway corridors present in the RMR, and destined to meet the needs of this region until the year 2000.
In November 1975, the Federal Government approved the creation of the National Urban Transportation System (SNTU) and the Brazilian Urban Transport Company (EBTU).
In September 1979, the Ministry of Transport launched the “Alternative Transportation Fuel Economy Program”, with special emphasis on Rail Transportation – subways, light rail and urban trains – as effective instruments to reduce fuel consumption in large urban centres.
This Program had a major impact at the regional level and, on 19 November 1979, the Public Passenger Transportation System in the Recife Metropolitan Region (STPP/RMR) was established.
Finally, in 1982, through a review of the old GEIPOT study, the Recife Metropolitan Train Project was created, giving priority to the Recife-Jaboatão connection, with a branch from Coqueiral to the interstate bus terminal.
However, despite the efforts made, it was only on 11 March 1985 that the first stage of the surface metro, with 6.5km (from Recife to Wernek), could be inaugurated and begin operations.
A few years later, the metro would have a length of 20.5km and 17 stations: Recife, Joana Bezerra, Afogados, Ipiranga, Mangueira, Santa Luzia, Edgard Werneck, Barro, Tejipió, Coqueiral, Cavaleiro, Floriano, Engenho Velho, Jaboatão, Alto do Céu, Curado and Rodoviária [the interstate bus terminal].
METROREC was designed to serve 165,000 users per day. In December of 2002, the metro’s fleet was 25 trains, and each train in turn had four cars, each of them 22m long.
Recife Metro – METROREC – is powered by electricity, has an air conditioning system, new brake systems and static inverters, which were modernised by the Siemens Consortium to ensure comfort and safety to the population.
For two years, due to bidding problems, METROREC’s expansion was halted. At present, the system is being enlarged with the construction of a further 14.3km on the South line. In this sense, by the end of 2004, the Government intends to inaugurate 10 new stations, including the Rodoviária-Camaragibe and Joana Bezerra-Imbiribeira (the first part of the so-called South line).
It is noteworthy that after the advent of the surface metro, the city’s trains were removed from circulation. However, before that happened (in 1972) the Train Museum was created, which operates from the old Central Station and has two steam-powered locomotives and one driven by diesel oil in its patio.
Recife, 24 May 2004.
Translated by Peter Leamy, December 2016.
sources consulted
AGORA vá de metrô. Recife: Metrorec; CBTU/EBTU/RFFSA, [1985].
METRÔ do Recife: solução social. Recife: Metrorec, 1985.
METROREC. Disponível em: <http://www.skyscrapercity.com/>. Acesso em: 11 maio 2004.
ROCHA, Tadeu. Roteiros do Recife (Olinda e Guararapes). 3. ed. Recife: Gráfica Ipanema, 1967.
how to quote this text
Source: VAINSENCHER, Semira Adler. Metrô do Recife (Metrorec). Pesquisa Escolar Online, Fundação Joaquim Nabuco, Recife. Disponível em: <https://pesquisaescolar.fundaj.gov.br/en/>. Acesso em:dia mês ano. Ex: 6 ago. 2009.