A linha do Corgo revisitada: o significado do traçado desativado entre Régua e Chaves

Abstract

Before the development of cattle herding and farming, all humans were nomads. Spatial dislocation has always been an implicit activity to the human condition, from the earliest times to the present day.In order to increasingly facilitate the dislocation of people and goods, the formation of paths, roads and other transport routes began to arise. With the progressive stabilization of route layouts and the evolution of transportation systems, the movement of people and the travelled distances increased, resulting in the need for developing overnight accommodations, promoting the relationship and stabilization between route layouts and urban settlement.The competition between transportation means and services led to a growing reorganization of the travel system. In Portugal, the continuous reorganization of the travel system ended up potentiating the use of road transport in detriment of rail transport. This policy led to the closure of the majority of narrow-gauge railways, especially in areas with low population density. The area under study in the scope of this work is representative of this type of railways which, in the meantime, have been deactivated.The Corgo Line, which connects the Douro Line to Chaves, is the object of study of this dissertation. The linear space that is defined by the deactivated Corgo Line railway, which is nowadays used for different purposes, seems to be in disagreement with the surrounding built environment, due to the deactivation of railways and subsequent closure of railway stations. This did not happen before the referred deactivation.This work is intended to reflect on the territory that is occupied by the Corgo Line while taking into account the current circumstances. The aim is to create a methodology that seeks further knowledge on that specific territory in order to assist policy decisions and the wishes of the population.