A Mocăniţă is a narrow gauge railway in Romania (most notably in mountainous areas in Maramureş, Transylvania, and Bukovina), and the locomotives operating on them. The word mocăniţă is a term of endearment, derived from the Romanian word mocan (meaning shepherd or one who lives in the mountains), and suffixed as feminine and diminutive. Many of these forestry railways were built in the era of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, especially in the Carpathian Mountains. They followed the rivers, often necessitating tight curves, hence the use of the narrow gauge. The tracks were constructed so as to enable small locomotives to pull empty logging wagons up into the mountains and to let heavily loaded trains roll down under gravity to the saw mills.
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