The Compañía General de Ferrocarriles en la Provincia de Buenos Aires (CGBA) (in French: "Compagnie générale de chemins de fer dans la Province de Buenos Aires") was a French–owned company, formed in 1904, which operated a

metre-gauge Metre-gauge railways are narrow-gauge railways with track gauge of or 1 metre. The metre gauge is used in around of tracks around the world. It was used by European colonial powers, such as the French, British and German Empires. In Europe, la ...

railway network in

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

History

In 1904 the company took over a concession to build lines between the ports of

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata, on South ...

and Rosario, and to La Plata, together with other

branch line A branch line is a phrase used in railway terminology to denote a secondary railway line which branches off a more important through route, usually a main line. A very short branch line may be called a spur line. Industrial spur An industr ...

s in the west and south of Buenos Aires Province. These lines were built as detailed below: Buchanan sep1910

The company always faced tough competition from the various large British-owned railway companies operating in the Province who had already built lines in those areas where most profit was to be made. As a result of this competition, plans to build a line between Buenos Aires and Bahía Blanca and other branch lines were abandoned. When the Government of

Juan Domingo Perón ''Juan'' is a given name, the Spanish and Manx versions of ''John''. It is very common in Spain and in other Spanish-speaking communities around the world and in the Philippines, and also (pronounced differently) in the Isle of Man. In Spanish, ...

took over the railways in 1948, the CGBA became part of Ferrocarril Belgrano. In 1961 the Government of

Arturo Illia Arturo Umberto Illia (; 4 August 1900 – 18 January 1983) was an Argentine politician and physician, who was President of Argentina from 12 October 1963, to 28 June 1966. He was a member of the centrist Radical Civic Union. Illia reached t ...

decided to close all the lines that were uneconomic so many branches were closed, such as the CGBA's G3 (to Port of La Plata), G4 (to General Villegas), G5 (to Victorino de la Plaza) and G6 (to Vedia). Although some branches would be re-opened later, those reopenings were temporal, being the most of them definitely closed in 1977 by the de facto government in power in Argentina by then. Of those branches, only G remained active but only to

González Catán González Catán is a city located in La Matanza Partido, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. The city is the second-largest by area in the county (52 km²), and the second most-populous. The city is located near the southwestern end of the Grea ...

. During the

railway privatisation in Argentina Railway privatisation in Argentina was a process which began in 1993 under the presidency of Carlos Menem, following a series of neoliberal economic reforms. This primarily consisted of breaking up the state-owned railway company Ferrocarriles Ar ...

in 1992, the line was taken over by

Metropolitano Metropolitano S.A. was a privately owned consortium formed in 1994 to take over concessions granted by the Argentine government as part of railway privatisation during the presidency of Carlos Menem for the operation of commuter rail services i ...

, that operated the line until the contract of concession was revoked by the Government of Argentina in 2007. As a result, the Buenos Aires-González Catán branch was operated by the consortium UGOFE until February 2014 when the whole Belgrano Sur Line was re-privatised and given in concession to private company "Argentren" of Emepa Group. UGOFE was therefore dissolved.

Gallery

File:Las marianas.jpg, Las Marianas File:Mercedes cgba.jpg, Mercedes platform File:Mercedes station fcbelgrano.jpg, Mercedes building File:Angel etcheverry.jpg, Angel Etcheverry File:La verde.jpg, La Verde File:Moll.jpg, Moll

Notes

References

External links

Amigos del Ferrocarril Belgrano
a civil association dedicated to recover Ferrocarril Belgrano's tracks and stations {{DEFAULTSORT:Ferrocarril Compania General En La Provincia De Buenos Aires c c c c c c c

History

Gallery

See also

Notes

References

External links