Closed to passengers since 2001, the disused Leopoldina Station on the edge of the Port Zone fell under a similar period of neglect to that famous region which is now a focus of the city administration's regeneration project. No such plans exist to return Leopoldina to its former glories, and the outside remains strewn with grafitti, but, once inside, the blank canvas of the huge main room and the crumbling trains in the back is an event producer's dream.

The annual Back2Black Festival now calls the station home, in 2012 the ComiCon expo was held, and the city's huge ArtRio event the same year was the catalyst for an enormous installation by the artist Ernesto Neto. Sporadic events help to keep the venue on people's lips, then, but only the much-mooted bullet train from Rio to São Paulo would truly bring it back to its original purpose.