Cepu Forest Railway Du Croo Brauns Locomotive

The Cepu Forest Railway (officially branded as Loco Tour Cepu) is a

narrow gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge (distance between the rails) narrower than . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with Minimum railw ...

light

logging railway A forest railway, forest tram, timber line, logging railway or logging railroad is a mode of railway transport which is used for forestry tasks, primarily the transportation of felling, felled Trunk (botany), logs to sawmills or railway stations. ...

that runs through

teak Teak (''Tectona grandis'') is a tropical hardwood tree species in the family Lamiaceae. It is a large, deciduous tree that occurs in mixed hardwood forests. ''Tectona grandis'' has small, fragrant white flowers arranged in dense clusters (panic ...

plantations to the northwest of the town of Cepu, in Cepu district, on the boundary between Central and East Java provinces, on the island of

Java Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...

. It is owned by Perhutani, a state-owned forestry company of Indonesia. Steam traction is still dominant. The iconic bridge on the Cepu Forest Railway

The iconic bridge on the Cepu Forest Railway

COLLECTIE TROPENMUSEUM Brug en een bosrailbaan voor het vervoer van djati Houtvesterij Tjepoe Midden Java TMnr 10013034

Along with Olean Sugar Mill in

Situbondo Situbondo Regency ( Madurese: ''Kabhupatèn Situbânḍâ'') is a regency ''(kabupaten)'' in the east of East Java province, Indonesia. It covers an area of 1,658.03 km2, and had a population of 647,619 at the 2010 CensusBiro Pusat Statisti ...

, East Java (a candidate

World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

), Tasik Madu sugar mill and the

rack railway A rack railway (also rack-and-pinion railway, cog railway, or cogwheel railway) is a steep grade railway with a toothed rack rail, usually between the running rails. The trains are fitted with one or more cog wheels or pinions that mesh with ...

Ambarawa Ambarawa is a town and an administrative district (''kecamatan'') of the Semarang Regency, located between the cities of Semarang and Salatiga in Central Java Province of Indonesia. Administratively, it is bordered by the districts of Banyubiru ...

(both also in Central Java), the Cepu Forest Railway is one of the four main centres of steam railway heritage remaining in Java. In fact, with four operable steam locomotives, built by

Berliner Maschinenbau Berliner Maschinenbau AG was a German manufacturer of locomotives. The factory was founded by Louis Victor Robert Schwartzkopff on 3 October 1852 as ''Eisengießerei und Maschinen-Fabrik von L. Schwartzkopff'' in Berlin. History The factor ...

and Du Croo & Brauns, the Cepu depot has the largest concentration of active preserved steam locomotives in Indonesia. It is therefore of major heritage importance and due to its globally significant status as an active and complete steam locomotive-powered logging railway it might also be considered a candidate World Heritage Site. The railway was originally constructed circa 1915 and was fully operational until the late 1990s, with over of track in the Perhutani forests. Since 1998 much of the track has been lifted, but occasional logging trains continued to operate until 2002. Since 2002 only chartered logging trains and a tourist train have been run (Loko Tour). The railway is popular with foreign tourists, especially from

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

, the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

and

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. The main remaining line is of a distance of around to an

arboretum An arboretum (: arboreta) is a botanical collection composed exclusively of trees and shrubs of a variety of species. Originally mostly created as a section in a larger garden or park for specimens of mostly non-local species, many modern arbor ...

where there are spectacular 150-year-old teak trees along with a visitor centre where tourist train passengers are often entertained by local cultural shows. In 2006 a bridge just outside Cepu was damaged by flooding. In late 2007 this was repaired, and tourist trains were restored to the arboretum in December 2007. Since then there have been numerous tours and chartered logging trains. There were also reportedly 'real' logging trains run early in 2010 when otherwise inaccessible trees brought down by storm damage were removed using steam trains. Tours and charter trains are marketed and run by PT Palawi, a subsidiary of Perhutani, in Jakarta.

Rolling stock

Steam locomotives

Diesel locomotives

References

Further reading