Railways

Argentina: Railways

Lines: General Belgrano (narrow-gauge), General Roca, General Bartolomé Mitre, General San Martín, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (all wide-gauge), General Urquiza (medium-gauge) and Línea Metropolitana, which controls the railways of Buenos Aires and its suburbs. There are direct rail links with the Bolivian Railways network to Santa Cruz de la Sierra and La Paz; with Chile, through the Las Cuevas–Caracoles tunnel (across the Andes) and between Salta and Antofagasta; with Brazil, across the Paso de los Libres and Uruguayana bridge; with Paraguay (between Posadas and Encarnación by ferry-boat); and with Uruguay (between Concordia and Salto). In 2005 there were 32,170 km of tracks.

Plans for the privatization of the state-run Ferrocarriles Argentinos (FA) were initiated in 1991. In 1993 central government funding for the FA was suspended and responsibility for existing intercity passenger routes was devolved to respective provincial governments. However, owing to lack of resources, few provinces have successfully assumed the operation of services, and many trains have been suspended. At the same time, long-distance freight services were sold as six separate 30-year concessions (including lines and rolling stock) to private operators. In the mid-1990s the FA was replaced by Ente Nacional de Administración de Bienes Ferroviarios (ENABIEF), which assumed responsibility for railway infrastructure and the rolling stock not already sold off. The Buenos Aires commuter system was divided into eight concerns (one of which incorporates the underground railway system) and was offered for sale to private operators as 10- or 20-year (subsidized) concessions. The railway network is currently regulated by the Comisión Nacional de Regulación del Transporte (CNRT—see above).

Citation: Railways (Argentina), in Europa World online. London, Routledge. Retrieved 21 November 2008 from http://www.europaworld.com/pub/entry/ar.dir.687