Life along the tracks.

Carreira 28 is Lisbon’s most iconic tram line, a yellow relic that has been making its way through the city’s oldest and steepest neighbourhoods since 1914. It climbs hills that shouldn’t be climbable, squeezes through streets that shouldn’t fit a tram, and connects the hilltop district of Graça to the flat-lands of Martim Moniz in a journey that is worth every minute of it.

In 2019, I walked the route in reverse, starting at ‘the end of the line’ at Prazeres cemetery and walking back toward Martim Moniz.

The tram passes through this route six times an hour. Most of the people on it now however are tourists, cameras raised, waiting for the famous shot of the yellow car on the narrow street. Walking it means seeing life surrounding that tram line. The dog walkers and the delivery men, the laundry on the balconies, the blue doors and the beautiful tiles and the man who has been sitting on the same step every morning for twenty years. The city that exists between the tourist shots.

These 48 pages are that city.

About the Virtual Journeys series

This is part of the Virtual Journeys project, a series of urban walks translated into graphic novel pages. Between 1000 to 1500 photo’s made on a city walk that shows familiar scenes in unfamiliar places. On average I make one photo every 10 seconds.

The photo’s are selected, cut-up and processed to create a graphical novel experience. Reduced photo-realism and colours remove distractions and enhance the scene.

These are stories about life in a city that is very close to our own life. Showing that all over the world we are doing the same things.

[View all Virtual Journeys]