Before I visited I had never considered Morocco as a particular place of interest for a rail enthusiast / gunzel. Nobody had ever mentioned it to me and I don’t remember seeing anything beforehand. But after my trip I think it should be a place on the list to visit for railfans.

The main reason is that the country is a melting pot of all sorts of different things. You have a modern high speed railway (branded as Al Boraq) running alongside much older goods wagons and locomotives from the 1960s and even earlier.

Its variety of rolling stock isn’t just about its age. As a country with historic ties to France, Spain and other countries with rail industries, Morocco’s trains come from all over the world. There aren’t many other countries with such a geographically diverse fleet.

For some examples, see this ONCF Z2M below at Kenitra Railway Station. It’s part of the ALe 426/506 TAF family, built in Italy.

Then you have these RA9 Eurofima passenger carriages. These were built in the 1970s in Germany and bought second-hand by ONCF, I think from the French rail operator SNCF. They’re being progressively phased out in Europe but are still commonly used in Morocco (and seem absolutely fine).

Then you have the ZM class trains used on mainly suburban commuter lines. These are based on the MS80 ‘Breaks’ from Belgium.

Morocco clearly takes a lot of pride in its railways. This is visible not just in the amount of new investment that is taking place but also in the way that the network is operated and designed.

Not only did it build Africa’s first high-speed rail line in 2018, it is now expanding it even further. When finished it will link Agadir in the south all the way to Tangier on the north coast.

Even if you are more interested in services than infrastructure, it delivers on that as well. My observations of the network and usability as a passenger were very good. For example, the intercity station in Casablanca (Casa-Voyageurs) is excellent. It has been recently renovated and is very well laid-out with clear wayfinding and clean facilities.

For a foreigner, fares are cheap. Even first class is affordable. You will pay more to travel on the Al Boraq high speed trains but it is well worth it if you can.

As with all transport networks though there is room for improvement.

The Casablanca Airport Train runs at an almost-unusable hourly frequency. I am guessing that there may be some politics here with taxi drivers fearing a loss of trade but I am not sure.

The ONCF website also has a blanket block on any IP address outside Morocco and is very slow. This made it difficult to buy tickets and find service information. There are some reliable third parties where you can obtain both.

There is also surprisingly little information on the specifics of Moroccan rail transport online. Most that exists is in French but even this is patchy. I am planning to improve the Wikipedia pages and pool of Commons photos when I get a chance.

I am also planning some more specific posts on the trips that I made through Morocco on this trip, so expect to see more details in the near future.