HONDAGUA 2026 - BEAUTY AND THE BEAST.

ATTN Whingers: The person appearing in the title is an AI fake.
Not an actual real individual at Hondagua last month. 

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Hondagua Station, located in the province of Quezon, Philippines, was inaugurated on May 10, 1916, marking a significant expansion of the Philippine National Railways (PNR) Main Line South. This extension connected Padre Burgos to Calauag, threading through the scenic landscape of southern Quezon and establishing Hondagua as a key stop on the route.

As part of the Main Line South, Hondagua Station served both passenger and freight traffic, supporting the growing economic activities of the region, especially during the early 20th century. The station’s establishment not only improved connectivity for towns along the route but also played a vital role in facilitating trade and transport between Quezon Province and Manila.

Today, while train services are not currently operating, the sad remains of Hondagua Station, and crew dormitory, stand as a historical reminder of the PNR's expansion era, echoing stories of journeys taken across the archipelago by rail and underscoring the enduring importance of rail travel in the Philippines.

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Hondagua - Beauty & The Beast

Unusual attitudes indeed.

  Long-term readers of this blog will already know of my fascination with Hondagua, particularly its once-massive railway yard. Over the years, I have made many stops here during Bicol trips, partly out of personal interest, and partly to document what remains of this remarkable location before time and neglect eventually finish the job.

  Until my more recent discoveries in Negros, Hondagua was comfortably my favourite part of the Philippines. While Visayas may now hold that title overall, Hondagua remains my favourite part of Luzon.

  Situated beside Lopez Bay, the views from the now largely derelict station and sprawling former yard are genuinely spectacular. It is one of those rare places where abandoned railway infrastructure and coastal scenery somehow combine into an oddly relaxing atmosphere for railway heritage recording.

Yet the place also has a strange side.

  The yard today functions as a public pathway, with locals walking, riding motorbikes, accessing nearby homes, beach areas, cottages, and a so-called “resort.”

 Illegal skates continue to operate along the line as well which, while providing more transport usefulness than the railway itself currently does, is still illegal and just overlooked by guards who find historians more of a grave threat to the social fabric.

  Photography, videography, and that dreadful modern term “vlogging” seem to occur there constantly without issue when it comes to the locals.

  Which makes it rather curious why I appear to become the main attraction for issues every time I visit.

  Perhaps it is simply the obvious difference in nationality.

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Anyway, lets look at 2026.

To be the last visit, with heritage efforts far more appreciated elsewhere.

Above and four below.

One of the few highlights in two days of miserable PNR experiences on this history recording visit was finally getting to see some of the ten new container wagons recently delivered from China.

While not likely to be used for such, the twist locks on each suggest they were actually meant for container usage. With the port lines all gone, and the railways in Manila totally destroyed, I can't see any intermodal traffic starting anytime soon. 

Numbers: 004, 005, and 007 

Hondagua Yard, Quezon Province 

Relevant links in the 'Further Reading' section below.

Photos: Brad Peadon

Above and below.

 Northern leg of the former large triangle that ran out to the point seen below. The southern leg ran close to the large blue building which is a local flour mill.

Photos: Brad Peadon

Above and below.
Hondagua yard looking north towards Manila. Well, once you could get to Manila, today you can't even reach Calamba proper, even if there were timetable services in this section at this time.

It was once a much bigger yard, even had a shed in the scrub to the left.

Photos: Brad Peadon

Looking south from the south end of the yard.

Photo: Brad Peadon

The last surviving observation car RDO-204 which I have long pushed for heritage preservation.

Photo: Brad Peadon

GC-63 was formerly a FL (original coding still on side) but was one of a number converted as such.

Photo: Brad Peadon

Above and below

Former Bicol Express carriage, ex-Japanese 14 63, is currently stored in this picturesque.

Photos: Brad Peadon

Twist locks on the new Chinese built container wagons.

Photos: Brad Peadon

Above and three below.
A heritage disaster up there with that of the original Lucena station building that lays in ruins despite earlier demands it be rebuild.

Hondagua was a beautiful station building when I first visited this location. Locals tell me that what is there now was a result of a rebuild that ended up being discontinued.

Where a restoration of the original structure, along with a nearby high level platform, could have been an amazing heritage addition to the town ....... we have got this.

Maybe it is the reason I am singled out for attention by security guards in an effort to not let it be seen.

Photos: Brad Peadon

A Facebook post showing photos of the yard when the station was a little more intact, and taken by someone that wasn't harassed for taking photos.

Above and six below.

The poor old Hondagua PNR staff dormitory was a magnificent old structure, but it shall almost certainly go the way of the heritage station building.

Of interest are the regular reports about the building being haunted. Despite the stories, I've not found much about it online.

While no official investigations have been done, there have been many local reports of footsteps in empty buildings, shadow figures near the dormitory,

lights appearing where there is supposedly no power,

and the feeling of being watched around the old crew quarters.

Given it is all now at the brink of collapse, the ghosts may have caught one the rare trains to another town :-)

Photos: Brad Peadon

For our final shot (below) we see the dormitory building on one of my heritage surveys just seven years back.

I guess the ever present typhoons do not help maintain such amazing structures.

Photo: Brad Peadon

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Nhing and our driver.

wikipedia.org

PNR Security Staff.

Philippine National Railways

Philippine National Railways - Wikipedia

Philippine Railway Historical Society 

Free Philippine Railway Publications

Philippine Railway Historical Society Website

Philippine Flour Mill - Hondagua

Tongling Tieke Railway Equipment Co Ltd

Pink Armour Corporation

Philippine Association of Rail Enthusiasts
Our Sister group.

Negros/Panay Sugar Tramways & History - Past & Present

Semi-Retired Foamer Travel & Aviation

Website. 

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2010/11: RANDOM LRT/MRT SHOTS

 

Howdee, and welcome to the 26th year of the 'Philippine Railway Historical Society', a celebration of a quarter century of existence.

We will be looking back on those 26 years later on in the year, but most of this year will be spent looking back on our massive 2010 visit.

Due to the huge variety of photos taken during the 2010 trip, we will be separating the different subjects into various posts over the next 12 months. 

Locomotives - Rollingstock - Infrastructure - Railcars

Also rail employees - railfans - passengers.

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LRT 1

   Ah yes, the Manila Light Rail Transit Line 1—Metro Manila’s original rail superstar, still doing its thing decades after its 1984 debut, and somehow managing to age like a mix of fine wine and a slightly creaky antique cabinet. Running from Fernando Poe Jr. Station down past its old stomping ground at Baclaran and now stretching further south toward Dr. Santos Station, the line has decided that if Manila traffic won’t get any shorter, it might as well get longer. The extension is a welcome upgrade—giving more people access to the system and slightly expanding the daily arena where commuters test their balance, patience, and lung capacity.

In a plot twist worthy of a long-running soap opera, some of the oldest trains—the ones that sounded like they were held together by nostalgia and good intentions—have finally been shown the exit door. In their place, newer rolling stock has stepped in, bringing with it the radical concept of smoother rides and functioning air-conditioning (most of the time, anyway). But don’t worry, the classic LRT-1 experience remains intact: peak hour still feels like a full-contact sport, and every trip carries that faint sense of unpredictability. Still, for all its quirks, it’s hard not to admire the line’s persistence—because even with upgrades, extensions, and a gradual farewell to its oldest workhorses, it continues to outperform the alternative of being stuck on EDSA contemplating your life choices.

3G 1208 leaving Blumentritt station.

Photo: Brad Peadon

Both platforms at Blumentritt station.

Photo: Brad Peadon

3G 1232 arriving Blumentritt station.

Photo: Brad Peadon

3G 1221 leaving Blumentritt station.

Photo: Brad Peadon

Above and below

The then fleet oldies that have now for the most part being retired. However, there is reports of some seeing limited use for school runs.

1009 (above) and 1057 (below)

Photos: Brad Peadon

Above and below

Some more of the 1G oldies.

1063 (above) and 1060 (below), both at Blumentritt.

Photos: Brad Peadon

LRT1 Flagship 1G 1001 makes a stop at Blumentritt.

The station sits above the now violated PNR station of the same name.

Photo: Brad Peadon

PRHS Railfan Day out on the LRT1 with Mr Brian Young who was instrumental in organising it.

Photos: Brad Peadon

3G 1204 about to depart the then terminus of Baclaran.

Photo: Brad Peadon

1G 1030 about to arrive at the then terminus of Baclaran.

Photo: Brad Peadon

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LRT 2

  The Manila Light Rail Transit Line 2—the slightly more refined sibling in Metro Manila’s rail family, often described as “the good one” by commuters who enjoy such luxuries as space to breathe and trains that don’t feel like they’re auditioning for a percussion band. Opening in stages from 2003, the line stretches from Recto Station out to Antipolo Station, gliding above the chaos with a level of calm that feels almost suspicious. It’s the line you take when you want to pretend, just briefly, that Metro Manila commuting isn’t a daily survival challenge.

  Of course, this is still Manila, so LRT-2 has had its fair share of “character-building moments.” There was the small matter of a rather inconvenient fire in 2019, which knocked out a chunk of the line and left commuters rediscovering their old friend—soul-crushing road traffic. Sections were closed for what felt like an eternity (in commuter time, roughly equivalent to three lifetimes), before gradually reopening and restoring order to the universe. But through it all, LRT-2 has maintained its reputation as the system’s overachiever: wider trains, smoother rides, and stations that don’t immediately test your will to live. It may not be perfect, but in the grand hierarchy of Manila transport, it’s about as close to first class as you’re going to get without leaving the country.

There have been various discussions and half-baked ideas over the years around supplementing—or in the most extreme interpretations, replacing—rail capacity with bus-based systems along parts of the Manila Light Rail Transit Line 2 corridor. These ideas tend to pop up whenever funding, maintenance issues, or expansion delays come into focus, because buses are seen as cheaper and quicker to deploy. The Philippines already has a precedent with the EDSA Busway, which governments love pointing at like it’s the transport equivalent of duct tape: “Look, it works here, let’s try it everywhere!”

But here’s the problem—LRT-2 is not your average light rail line. It’s essentially a full-blown heavy metro in disguise, designed to carry far more people than buses ever realistically could in the same corridor. Replacing (or even seriously downgrading) that capacity with a busway would be like swapping a multi-car electric train for a convoy of slightly optimistic minibuses and hoping nobody notices. The line already moves tens of thousands daily and was specifically built to relieve congestion and reduce reliance on road transport —so replacing it with… more road transport is, let’s say, a bold interpretation of problem-solving.

To be fair, most of these “busway” ideas aren’t formal, fully-approved plans to rip up the railway (no one’s shown up with a crowbar… yet). They tend to be stopgap or parallel proposals, especially during disruptions (like after the 2019 depot fire) or when expansion funding gets messy. Governments look at buses as a flexible band-aid while rail projects—like extensions or PPP upgrades—crawl through bureaucracy at the speed of continental drift .

Above and below.

Sets 9 & 17 stop at the Araneta Center-Cubao station to dump/pickup passengers.

Photos: Brad Peadon

Set 1 (the LRT2 flagship I guess) stop at the Araneta Center-Cubao station to dump/pickup passengers.

Photo: Brad Peadon

Above and below

Set 18 at Recto station was one of the sets involved in the rather bad collision in May 2019..

Photo: Brad Peadon

Set 14 about to depart the mildly humourously named Recto station.

Photo: Brad Peadon

Set 1 seen again, this time at Recto station.

Photo: Brad Peadon

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MRT 3

Not so much a railway as a daily social experiment, the Manila Metro Rail Transit Line 3 has spent decades answering the important question: just how many people can you fit into a single train before physics files a complaint? Running the length of EDSA since 1999, it was meant to be the great saviour of Manila commuting. Instead, it became a kind of endurance sport—equal parts transport system and character-building exercise—where success is measured by whether you board at all, not whether you arrive comfortably.

Then came one of its more memorable subplots: the arrival of brand-new trains from CRRC Dalian, which were supposed to solve overcrowding and usher in a bright new era. Instead, they spent years sitting around like very expensive ornaments, thanks to compatibility issues, platform mismatches, and the general realisation that buying trains is only half the battle—making them actually work is apparently the tricky part. For a long time, they became symbols of everything that could go wrong in public transport planning: shiny, modern, and about as useful as a chocolate teapot.

To its credit, MRT-3 has clawed its way back from years of breakdowns, derailments, and maintenance sagas that felt more like long-running soap operas than infrastructure management. Recent rehabilitation has made the line far more reliable than its darker days, though the memories linger—along with the peak-hour crush that continues to test both patience and personal space. In the end, it remains a deeply flawed but utterly essential lifeline, proving that in Manila, even a railway with a dramatic past (and a few sidelined trains) is still infinitely preferable to being stuck on EDSA, slowly ageing in the endless freaking heat and traffic while pondering every pathetic decision in life that led you there.

  Well, I’m cautiously—and I do mean cautiously—pleased to announce that we’re limping toward the end of our 2010 coverage on the website. Yes, after what feels like a geological era, the finish line is finally in sight.

 A heartfelt thank you to everyone who’s followed along and actually enjoyed it, as well as a special nod to the dedicated critics who’ve made a hobby out of disliking it. Your commitment to being upset has not gone unnoticed.

  There’s just one final 2010 post to go before we bravely stagger into 2011—truly cutting-edge material, only about a decade and a half late. After that, we might even shock the system with some “recent” content from 2025, assuming nobody objects too loudly.

 In the meantime, feel free to enjoy it, despise it, or sit somewhere in between—really, whatever level of emotional and intellectual development you’ve managed to reach will do nicely.

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MrX and Nhing.

Plus a couple of strangely normal security guards.

LRT1 Official Website

LRT2 Official Website

MRT3 Official Website

Philippine Railway Historical Society 

Philippine Association of Rail Enthusiasts
Our Sister group.

Free Philippine Railway Publications

Love The Philippines

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