Pigeon Peat Museum Railway

The Baloži Peat Railway – from industrial to museum railway

Peat mining in the Baloži area has a long history, but the peat railway itself developed significantly after the establishment of the Baloži peat factory in 1947. To transport peat from the bogs to the factory, a 750 mm wide narrow-gauge railway network was created, the total length of which over time reached at least 28 kilometers.

The railway was also connected to Baloži station on the Riga–Jelgava railway line. This allowed peat to be loaded onto broad-gauge wagons and transported further.

However, the industrial boom was followed by a decline. As peat reserves dried up and the economic situation changed after the collapse of the Soviet Union, both peat extraction and the railway network were reduced. Some of the dismantled tracks and rolling stock were later used to build a new peat railway in Inčukalns.

In Baloži, only about 2.5 kilometers of the once extensive network remained, from the factory to one of the mining fields. The railway had ceased operations by the end of 2011, and tractors took over peat transportation.

The abandoned tracks became a target for scrap metal thieves, especially in the spring of 2013. Since the railway was no longer needed for production, it was planned to dismantle the remaining part of it as well.

It was then that a different future opened up for the Baloži Peat Railway.

From demolition plan to museum railway

In the spring of 2013, upon learning of the railway's possible demolition, Baloži Railway enthusiasts organized a research trip to document its condition. At the same time, they began negotiations with SIA "Pindstrup Latvia", offering to preserve the railway as a museum railway rather than demolish it.

The idea was broader than just preserving the tracks – to combine the heritage of the peat railway with the story of peat extraction itself. After lengthy negotiations, an agreement was reached, and on August 28, 2013, a cooperation agreement was signed on the preservation of the railway, its transformation into a museum railway, and cooperation in the creation of a peat museum.

Baloži was also a suitable location because the BDK collection already contained many locomotives and wagons from the former peat railways. The Gulbene–Alūksne line is historically a mainline railway, not an industrial railway, so the Baloži line gave this narrow-gauge industrial heritage the opportunity to be preserved in an environment appropriate to it.

Already in 2013, the tracks began to be cleared of bushes, but in 2014, more extensive renovation work began - the tracks were repaired and the rolling stock was repaired.

Today, the Baloži peat railway is no longer just a testament to its industrial past. Excursions are organized along the preserved line, where you can take a trip on a historic train through the former peat mining fields. This is a way to learn about the history of the peat industry, the railway and human work not only through stories and museum exhibits, but also in the very place where this history once took place.

Relationship with military heritage

According to Dāvs Bušis, the Baloži peat processing plant was built by German prisoners of war from 1945 to 1949. According to the workers, the plant had its own weapons storage, and in one of the workshops, where peat processing was no longer taking place, a section of the RER plant operated, which manufactured both mechanical components of electrical contactors and triggers, as well as secret military orders, which were supposedly soldered at night... But it was not on a large scale.