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Welcome to the home page of the 'Philippine Railways Historical Society', which was set up to help and encourage fans of the Philippine railways. The PRHS main goal has been to research and share Philippine railway information, help others with a similar interest and answer the many questions from tourists heading there for a holiday.
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My other interests lay in railways around the Australasian region (Australia, Fiji, South East Asia). For lots of information, forums and other items related to them, please check out LocoShed Australasia.
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We are currently in the middle of a rebuild of the website which will be continuing through the first half of 2011. Plans are afoot for a section by section look at stations and infrastructure, latest heritage/preservation news section and updates on current rail operations and expansions.
Expect many changes as the society is placed through a transformation.

Thursday, January 6, 2011










Railway preservation has been mostly over looked in the Philippines over the years. A lack of interest in this history has seen only a handful of steam locomotives preserved across the mainstream and industrial rail systems. Most are in a bad condition, only one sugarfield version believed still steamable on Negros.


But not only steam has been the looser over the years, many very interesting diesel locomotives have operated across the islands, most also now gone on to suffer the fate of there earlier cousins.

In 1999 I first visited the Philippines and saw what was a industry in decline, one that I never expected to see again. I left wishing to show these railways to the world, thus leading to what is now the PRHS, but never really gave a great thought to the idea of major preservation attempts being made there.

Two subsequent visits later so much had changed for me. I had met many people with similar interests, both in the Philippines and overseas. I had made friends with a local Sydney resident called Bill Sullivan and we arranged to meet during early 2007 for a couple of times. We had talked about the railways there endlessly, we even floated the preservation idea a lot, but this was just a chance to actually go see these railways together in person.

The second day out was to be a pivitol one for Philippine railway preservation as we met local railfan Harvey Smoller, as well as my friend Edward Manapol (then working for PNR) and went to Caloocan workshops.
As always, the usual large amount of locomotives and carriages were sitting there, some little changed from my first look in 1999, all still waiting for the moment that need will hopefully see them placed back out on the rails. Some of this rollingstock was just normal day to day stuff, some however, like the carriage of former President Marcos, had much history behind it.
Yet desite the impressiveness of all these items, it was to be a lonely, derelict little BUDA car laying overgrown out back that lead us to say that "This stuff needs to be preserved".
Unlike so many other plans, this one took root and kept rolling. Eventually it became waht is now the 'Railways and Industrial Heritage Society Phils Inc', and under this name is still continuing to this day.

Bill sadly passed away last year, but had he not been part of this monumental moment in Philippine railway preservation history, it may not have got to where it is today.
These pages covering preservation are dedicated to him, preservation past, present and future.

Thanks Bill. Thanks Harv. Thanks to everyone who has helped since this day

Brad Peadon
Philippine Railway Historical Society







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