Museo Nacional de los Ferrocarriles Mexicanos, Puebla

The Museo Nacional de los Ferrocarriles Mexicanos preserves one of the key chapters in Mexico’s transport history.Opened in 1988 on former railway grounds, the museum preserves Mexico’s rail heritage through locomotives, carriages, tools, documents, and station spaces. Its collection includes more than 100 historic railway vehicles, from steam and diesel engines to passenger, freight, maintenance, and postal cars.

The open-air yard is one of the museum’s strongest features. Visitors can walk among locomotives, service wagons, and restored cars that show how trains moved people, goods, mail, and officials across long distances. Highlights include a presidential railcar with wooden finishes, a private bar, and an old cooking stove, as well as a postal wagon where mail was sorted in motion. The site also recalls the transport of goods such as pulque to regional markets.

Beyond the trains, the museum has an important research centre: CEDIF, the Centre for Railway Documentation and Research. Its archive preserves railway documents, maps, photographs, plans, and specialised books, including around 200,000 plans, nearly 89,000 images, and about 40,000 library items. The museum also hosts Sinfonía Vapor, a concert where orchestral music is paired with the sound of working steam locomotives.