page_title: Rail transport in Argentina
section_title: Development
hierarchical_section_title: Rail transport in Argentina / History / Development
caption_attribution_description: English: Passenger train with a steam locomotive in Las Heras, Santa Cruz Province. The line was the Puerto Deseado-Colonia Las Heras Railway.
context_page_description: The Argentine railway network consisted of a 47,000 km network at the end of the Second World War and was, in its time, one of the most extensive and prosperous in the world. However, with the increase in highway construction, there followed a sharp decline in railway profitability, leading to the break-up in 1993 of Ferrocarriles Argentinos, the state railroad corporation. During the period following privatisation, private and provincial railway companies were created and resurrected some of the major passenger routes that FA once operated.
  Dissatisfied with the private management of the railways, beginning in 2012 and following the Once Tragedy, the national government started to re-nationalise some of the private operators and ceased to renew their contracts. At the same time, Operadora Ferroviaria Sociedad del Estado was formed to manage the lines which were gradually taken over by the government in this period and Argentina's railways began receiving far greater investment than in previous decades.
context_section_description: The importance of foreign capital in the construction of the Argentine railways is perhaps overstated, with initial construction of the network beginning in 1855 at first with Argentine finance, which continued throughout the network's development. The Buenos Aires Western, Great Western and Great Southern railways (today the part of the San Martín, Sarmiento and Roca railways respectively) were all commenced using Argentine capital with the Buenos Aires Western Railway being the first to open its doors in the country, along with its Del Parque railway station.
  Following the adoption of liberal economic policies by president Bartolomé Mitre, these railways were sold off to foreign private interests, consisting of mostly British companies, in what would be the first of many acts where the ideological climate of the time would define the fate of the Argentine railways. These sales also included Argentina's first railway, the Buenos Aires Western (by now 1,014 km long), which was sold in 1890 to the British company New Western Railway of Buenos Aires for just over 8.1 million pounds (close to £500 million in 2005 money). This sale, and others that came after it, was heavily criticised at the time for being far lower than the actual value of the railway, and prompted many anti-British protests. In later years, this was also criticised by historians:
  During the 27 years in which it belonged to the Government of the Province of Buenos Aires, the Western Railway was the line which was most luxurious, least wasteful [...] and offered the most economical fares and cargo rates. It was a model company which was the pride of Argentina, in relation to which all the English railway companies established in our country were, without exception, second-rate…[But after the sale] the unnecessary growth in spending, largely due to the disproportionate increase in employees, the resulting decrease in returns and the rise in ticket prices made up a definite intent to sabotage: the Western Railway would quickly be discredited in the public opinion.
  — Raúl Scalabrini Ortiz, Historia de los Ferrocarriles Argentinos 
  In the years that followed, there were numerous cases of undervalued sales to British investors, including the 1,000 km (620 mi) long Andean Railway, which provoked much anti-British sentiment in the country. By 1910 the network had been monopolised by British companies, owned by large finance firms such as J.S. Morgan & Co. in London. Nevertheless, major development of the Argentine rail network occurred up to this period and the Argentine state also played a large role, financing ferrocarriles de fomento (development railways) in rural areas not attractive to private interests, while the Argentine State Railway had a 9,690 km (6,020 mi) network.
  By 1914, the Argentine rail network attained significant growth having added 30,000 km (19,000 mi) to the network between 1895 and 1914, which positioned the country as having the tenth largest rail network in the world in that year, at a point where the country had the tenth highest per-capita GDP in the world. Its expansion accelerated greatly due to the need for the transport of agricultural products and cattle in Buenos Aires Province. The rail network converged on the city of Buenos Aires and was a key component in the development of the Argentine economy as it rose to be a leading export country. However, with the advent of the First World War, then subsequently the Wall Street Crash and Great Depression, the rail network of the country experienced a much lower rate of growth after this period and had mostly ground to a halt by the beginning of the Second World War.
caption: Steam locomotive in Puerto Deseado, Santa Cruz Province (c.1920).
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