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With some 9.8 million inhabitants (16 million in the metropolitan area), São Paulo is the biggest city in Brazil.

São Paulo's is among the younger metros in the world and it's considered one of the most modern although today's extension does not cover all areas of this populous city. The metro network (Lines 1-5, 63 km) is complemented by a 260 km suburban network operated by CPTM (Lines A-F). The metro runs underground through the city centre but on elevated structures or at grade in outer areas. To reduce the cost of new construction some suburban lines were to be converted to metro and provide more frequent service. Finally they will remain separate from the metro network although upgrading has been completed along Line E, which serves the eastern neighbourhoods of the city and operates like an express metro parallel to Line 3, and on Line C, both lines still being operated by CPTM.

Most stations have side platforms (136-141m), the transfer stations Sé, Brás, Paraíso and Luz have separate platforms for boarding and alighting.

Gauge: 1600mm; 3rd rail (759V); 6-car-trains
CPTM trains have overhead power supply

14 Dec 1968 - Construction work began on Line 1

14 Sept 1974: Jabaquara - Vila Mariana
17 Feb 1975: Vila Mariana - Liberdade
26 Sept 1975: Liberdade - Santana (except Sé)
17 Feb 1978: Transfer station Sé finished
20 Apr 1998: Santana - Tucuruví

(14.7 km, 14 stations, all underground)

25 Jan 1991: Paraíso - Consolação
12 Sept 1992: Consolação - Clínicas and Paraíso - Ana Rosa
21 Nov 1998: Clínicas - Vila Madalena
15 Apr 2006: Ana Rosa - Imigrantes
09 May 2006: Chácara Klabin station added
30 June 2007: Imigrantes - Alto do Ipiranga
30 Jan 2010: Alto do Ipiranga - Sacomã
21 Aug 2010: Sacomã - Vila Prudente (without Tamanduateí station)
21 Sept 2010: Tamanduateí station

(22 km - 18 stations - underground between Sé and Marechal Deodoro)

10 Mar 1979: Sé - Brás
23 Aug 1980: Brás - Bresser
15 Sept 1981: Bresser - Belém
15 Nov 1981: Belém - Tatuapé
24 April 1982: Sé - República
26 Nov 1983: Anhangabaú station added
13 Nov 1986: Tatuapé - Penha
27 Aug 1988: Penha - Guilhermina-Esperança
17 Sept 1988: Guilhermina-Esperança - Artur Alvim
1 Oct 1988: Artur Alvim - Corinthians-Itaquera
17 Dec 1988: República - Barra Funda

(12.8 km, 11 stations when completed from Luz to Vila Sônia)

25 May 2010: Paulista - Faria Lima (3.6 km; without intermediate stations) - limited service
28 Mar 2011: Faria Lima - Butantã (without intermediate station)
17 May 2011: Pinheiros station
15 Sept 2011: Paulista - Luz (without Higienópolis station)

14 six-car trains were supplied by Hyundai Rotem, and the line was equipped by Siemens for driverless automatic operation (Trainguard MT CBTC); stations have platform screen doors. This line is operated by ViaQuatro.

(9.4 km - 6 stations: 7 km elevated, 0.8 km underground, 1.6 km at grade).

20 Oct. 2002: Capão Redondo - Largo 13

8 six-car-trains were delivered, partly built by Alstom, Siemens and CAF. Line 5 is the first line in São Paulo using international gauge (1435 mm), with overhead power supply at 1500 V.

An underground system was proposed as early as the 1920s, but it was only carried out in 1968. Commuter trains, however, have existed for a long time. The oldest CPTM trains operating today are Budds from the 1950's. Today's lines A and D are the oldest ones, they are actually a single railway built in 1868 by a British consortium called The São Paulo Railway, linking the port of Santos to Jundiaí, in the coffee-producing interior. In 1901 the imposing Luz station was built in downtown SP. The small stations of line A are a little older and very beautiful. On line D they are newer and uglier (1950's-1970's). Lines B and C were part of the former Sorocabana railway, built in the 1870's to link Sorocaba to SP by a Hungarian immigrant called Maylayski. What's now line B is the main stretch, beginning at the magnificent Júlio Prestes (1936) station, just two blocks away from Luz. Line C was built in the 1950's to meet another Sorocabana stretch that went down to Santos. In the late 70's, the State government decided to create a suburban commuter line, completed by 1983. The stations between Pinheiros and Santo Amaro (formerly Largo 13) were only built in 2000/01, however, already in the CPTM age. This is strange since this is exactly the most important part of the city crossed by the line. Today it's a major financial center with tens of futuristic skyscrapers and shopping malls. Lines E and F were the important Central do Brasil railway which links Brazil's three largest cities: SP, Rio and Belo Horizonte. The main stretch is line E. Line F departs from the main road after Tatuapé and meets it again at Calmon Viana. By the 1960's and 1970's these lines, which were operated by the Federal Government (unlike lines B and C, which were State owned) began offering a suburban rail service. In the 80's and early 90's it was very lousy (lines A and D, Federal too, were just as bad) with trains running late, without many doors and windows, with people on top of them and hanging out the doors-holes. It was only in 1999/2000 that improvements began to show. The State government imported the CAF and Siemens trains for lines E, C and D and built new stations, with Metrô standard, on lines C and E. The old trains were almost all revamped. Lines B and F remain a bit lousy, however. CPTM tracks are still used by freight trains. All long distance passenger train service in Brazil, which also used CPTM's lines, was dismantled from 1997 to 2000, since privatization rules only allows the new companies to explore payload transport. (Maurício Carvalho)

In 2008, the line letters were replaced by numbers to create a consistent numbering system with the Metro: A > 7; B > 8; C > 9; D > 10; E > 11; F >12

fully converted to metro standard in April 2001; previously referred to as line C. The 3-car-trains built by CAF (Spain) run on 1600 mm tracks (formerly metre gauge) with catenary at 3000 V. Since December 2001 the definitive 10 Siemens 4-car trains have been running there, although still blended with CAFs and the 1979 Cobrasma-Francorails.

17 Oct 2007: Jurubatuba - Autódromo
22 Apr 2008: Autódromo - Grajaú

(22 km)

27 May 2000 - former Line E operating from Brás to Guaianazes, with three new stations in eastern S.P.: Dom Bosco, José Bonifácio and Guaianazes. 8 stations along the former suburban line were closed to create an express metro line running parallel to line 3 (red). From 10 Nov 2003, trains have been running through to Luz.

 Projects

Line 4 (12.8 km underground) is still under construction from Butantã to Vila Sônia. More details on this project and other plans in São Paulo can be found here.

Line 5 is being extended in stages from Largo 13 towards Chácara Klabin.

Line 11 is being extended west to Barra Funda to relieve the busy Line 3 (Integração Centro).

Instead of an initially planned eastern extension for line 2, a monorail line (monotrilho) is under construction from Vila Prudente to Hospital Tiradentes (24 km, 17 stations). The line will be operated driverless with Bombardier's INNOVIA Monorail 300 system, with 54 seven-car trains (378 cars) equipped with CITYFLO 650 automatic train control technology.

Line 17 is another monorail which has been under construction since March 2012, with the first section linking Congonhas Airport to Murumbi station on line 9.

- A railway link to the Airport is scheduled to be completed in 2011. The line starts at Barra Funda and runs parallel to line F, then diverges towards Guarulhos and the airport.

View diagram with all extensions for 2017, (and a geographical map) designed by Leonardo Lisboa.

Sao Paulo State Secretariat for Metropolitan Transports (incl. information on projects, both metrô and commuter trains)

CPTM - Metropolitan Trains - Official Site

CBTU (CPTM) Page (Suburban Railways in Brazil)

São Paulo Metro Photo Gallery

Scanned map from my collection (1995) 68K

Transport Ministry

ANTP - Associação Nacional de Transportes Públicos

Metro São Paulo at Wikipedia and Wikipedia.pt