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Portuguese historiography has mostly adopted a pessimistic view regarding the contribution of the railways to the development of country. Yet, railway access helped to increase population concentration and economic development, favoring migration into towns, the growth of pre-existing urban centers, and the emergence of new centers. But railways tended to be more beneficial to regions that were already prosperous and to aggravate the conditions unfavorable to development in areas with greater structural weaknesses.
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Silveira et al. (2011) studied this question.
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