Abstract
At the turn of the 19th century, sub-Saharan Africa was the least urbanised region in the world, with only about 50 cities of more than 10,000 inhabitants. By 2010, the number of cities had increased to almost 3,000. This column, taken from a recent VoxEU eBook, explores how colonial railroad investments transformed Africa’s economic geography, and asks whether economic outcomes would have been different and development delayed without the railroads.