The Mexican Southern Railway is a narrow-gauge railway, 228 miles long, running from the city of Puebla to the city of Oaxaca, through the fertile region of Tehuacan. It was built by a British firm[46] of engineers, which later carried out an important part of the drainage works of the Valley of Mexico. The company is British, and the financial position of the enterprise, which had been one of difficulty formerly, has, under re-construction and the growing prosperity of the country, been enabled to double its earnings, and pay a dividend upon its ordinary stock.
46 Read, Campbell & Co., London.
The Vera Cruz and Pacific Railway runs from Cordoba, an important town before mentioned, on the Mexican Railway to Vera Cruz, to Santa Lucrecia, on the Tehuantepec Railway; and is of much importance, as it links the general railway system of the Republic with the transisthmus line. In addition to this, it has a branch line to Vera Cruz, and so becomes a through route of travel from that port to the Pacific Ocean, viâ Tehuantepec. The road carried a Government subsidy and was financed in the United States, but due to inefficient management and the heavy work involved in construction, the company suspended payments in 1903, and the Government, in view of the strategic importance of the line, took the property off the hands of the company. The railway is now operated under Government auspices as an individual concern. It is standard gauge, its length being 201 miles for the Tehuantepec connection, and 62 miles for the Vera Cruz branch.
The Vera Cruz (Mexico) Railways—not to be confounded with the Mexican (Vera Cruz) Railway—is a narrow-gauge line 44 miles long, running from the port of Vera Cruz along the coast to Alvarado—named after the Conquistador—a port near the estuary of the Papaloapam river. This navigable river, as elsewhere described, extends inland and gives access to an important tropical region. A tributary of this river, the San Juan, is navigable for small craft for a distance of 177 miles from Alvarado, at San Juan Evangelista, whence a short railway line connects with the Tehuantepec Railway, thus completing a through service of travel. The railway company and its steamers form a British enterprise, controlled by the constructors of the Tehuantepec Railway.
In the peninsula of Yucatan are the United Railways of Yucatan, giving communication with the chief cities and ports of that region. The total length of line embodied in the three divisions of this system is 373 miles; and there is a line from Merida to Peto, of 145 miles.
Returning now to the north of the Republic; the Rio Grande, Sierra Madre, and Pacific Railway runs westwardly from Ciudad Juarez, or El Paso, for a distance of 159 miles. It is an American enterprise, and traverses some good agricultural and mineral regions, serving the prosperous Mormon colonies founded by Americans in the State of Chihuahua. It is designed some day to traverse the Sierra Madre and reach the Pacific Ocean.
The Kansas City, Mexico and Orient is an important undertaking which, when it is concluded, will give a transcontinental route, from the railway system of the United States viâ Chihuahua, to a port on the Pacific Ocean—that of Topolobampo, on the Gulf of California. The length of the Mexican portion of the line is 634 miles, of which 332 are constructed. It opens up a vast new region of Western Mexico, and should be of growing importance, and of international service. It is an American enterprise, with British and Mexican associations. Connected with it is the Chihuahua and Pacific Railway.
The Sonora Railway runs from Nogales on the United States border, to the port of Guaymas on the Gulf of California, as described elsewhere, with a length of 265 miles. In connection with this railway, and with the Southern Pacific Railway of the United States, railway building in Western Mexico is projected by American capitalists, over routes already surveyed, for a length of more than 4,000 miles, portions of which are to be subsidised by the Mexican Government.
The Pan-American railway, as its name implies, is projected for the purpose of uniting North and South America by rail, its ultimate destination being Panama. At present the portion under construction is for linking the general system of the Republic with the isolated system of Yucatan, and thence to the frontier of Guatemala. The distance from its starting-point at San Geronimo on the Tehuantepec line, to the Panama Canal, is 1,650 miles; and the line is to form a link in the great project of a rail route from New York to Buenos Ayres. It is an American enterprise.
There are numerous other short lines throughout Mexico, serving mineral and agricultural regions, whether under Mexican, British, American, or other ownership, giving a total length of existing Mexico railways, of 14,180 miles. Thus it is shown that Mexico is covered with a network of railways, connected with each other and with the system of the United States, throughout the great length of her territory from north to south, and crossing from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean—in practically two instances—one completed and in operation, the other nearing completion. The new railway laws of Mexico will prevent undue competition and the duplicating of existing lines; and the Republic's railways ought in the future to be of developing value, in view of the considerable resources of the territory which they traverse, and of their geographical importance.