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Electrical Vehicles of the FC Urquiza in Buenos Aires/Argentina Our long-time meetings speaker, Dieter Hauss from Frankfurt/Main has shown us during his annual visit to the FLB some wonderful slides from Argentina, the destiny of last year's not realised FLB tour to Argentina. Three of the slides were of the FC Urquiza, a suburban line which earlier has been known for its interesting technical solutions. Thus on this line could be found the world's only horse-drawn sleeping cars which were underways for several hours. In more recent times, this line was a Light Rapid Transit line with the current drawn by trolleys from the overhead. This included used vehicles from Los Angeles. Today the line is operated by the Subway operator Metrovías and is its only suburban line with the designation F (for Federico Lacroze). Starting from the subway station with the same name of Line B (in former times its terminal) to General Lemos, it passes Campo de Mayo, an army base where during the seventies many opponents were tortured and buried. The line uses the habitual suburban trains of Buenos Aires and uses third rail for current collection. In earlier times there was a connexion to line B by a ramp, and the intention was already then to let the trains operate along line B to the city centre. Even this idea was taken up again, but there were always problems with the width of the vehicles which do not fit into the subway tunnel. According to information from Argentinean government sources the reason, however, was incompatibility of the trade unions concerned. The suburban line's trade union is a railway trade union, the one of the subway a metro trade union. Therefore, the suburban line drivers cannot operate on the subway, and vice versa, whereby a through service is impossible At present the trains enter via the existing ramp. Line B having in the meantime been extended by two stations, the present track layout is not well known. On the same line occasionally on sundays a steam train is operated by the railway museum association, Ferroclub Argentino whose base is at the intermediate station Coronel Francisco Lynch. Further out, the line divides into two which earlier both were equipped with overhead. The section o San Martin was closed on th 28th October 1961 and the overhead removed. On this line operated the horse-drawn tram and later the steam train mentioned above. The other, still electrified line ended in earlier times at Campo de Mayo and today continues by one stop to General Lemos. From 1955 started the equimen with third rail which was finished by 1967. On the LRT line there were many different vehichles, mostly from the American manufacturer Brill from Philadelphia. This firm used to publish a catalog from which the operators could order their tram cars. Photos can be found in the book "Latin America by Streetcar" by the famous American author Allen Morrison on pages 152 and 153 (with some informations). He also maintains a web site under http://www.tramz.com. His theme is the electrical urban transport in Latin America.
In 1927 the locomotives 203 and 204 from Baldwin and Westinghouse were built under the factory No. 60045 and 60046 for the Red River Lumber Co., a wood working firm.The locomotives had motors of 800 PS, a weight of 120 tons and a tracive power performance of 33,960 t. Locomotive 203 received after an accident a new body over the full length of the vehicle. The two locomotives were leased in 1944 to the Central California Traction Co. under the numbers 23 and 24 and in 1947 purchased by the Pacific Electric Railroad where they were given the numbers 1593 and 1592 (thus in reversed sequence). 1951 they were sold to the FC Urquiza and received the numbers 953 (PE 1593) and 952 (PE 1592). At the same time FC Urquiza bought from Pacific Electric locomotives 1590 and 1592, built by Baldwin and Westinghouse around the same time. They received the numbers 950 (PE 1590) and 951 (PE 1591). The FC Urquiza also bought from Pacific Electric locomotive 1599, built in its own workshop which received the FC Urquiza No. 954. Parts from it come from the Parlour Car "Alabama" which in 1905 was built by the St. Louis Car Company for the privat use of the Pacific Electric founder Henry E. Huntingdon . It was sold in 1920 to Sacramento Northern Railroad. When buying it, the Sacramento Northern RR aquired the body and the trucks without the motors. The trucks and the trolleys remained with the Pacific Electric and were used for locomotive 1599.
In1949 the firm of Tranvía Lacroze was nationalised and renamed Ferrocarril General Urquiza. Shortly thereafter, the system bought used interurban cars from the USA from Pacific Electric Railroad in Los Angeles, one of the largest interurban operators in the USA. Because of their colour, the cars were known as "Red Cars". Pacific Electric bought during the twenties a totol of 160 cars from Brill and the St. Louis Car Company, and they were known as series 600. These cars operated not only on the interurban lines, but also in Los Angeles. In particular they operated on the Hollywood Avenue and were therefore known as "Hollywood Cars". A good photograph can be found under http://www.oerm.org/pages/pe717.html, a car of the Orange Empire Railway Museum in San Bernardo, near Los Angeles where this webmaster in earlier times was a member and there travelled on this car. This were the last traditional cars before the arrival of the PCC cars. Of these cars, FC Urquiza bought in 1951 28 vehicles, built between 1925 and 1928, which Urquiza numbered in the series 1700. In1964 they were renumbered to the series 3700. They were in use until the early seventies when they were replaced by new Japanes subway cars. Two vehicles, 3734 and 3758 were rebuilt in 1964 to works cars (for track and current supply). They received third rail current collectors, and one, car 3758 built by the St. Louis Car Company was taken over by the Ferroclub Argentino in very poor shape and is at present beeing reconstruced. Information and photographs can be found under http://www.ferroclub.org.ar/Lynch/Lynch/Material/Subterraneos%20y%20tranvias.htm. In 1959 FC Urquiza acquired from the same operator 30 PCC cars of the type air-electric, built by the St. Louis Car Company in 1940, with two driving platforms and there known as cars No. 5000 to 5029, which were operated in Buenos Aires as series 1500 with the then usual left-hand traffic, but were in use for only three years. They were operated with trolleys and third rail. A good photograph can bei found in the well known PCC standard book, "PCC - the car that fought back" by Stephen P. Carlson and Fred W. Schneider, III, on page 230. Because of poor track, the PCC's operated only during three years. They were replaced by cars from the Key System in San Francisco. The Key system operated in earlier times over the Berkeley Bay Bridge to Berkeley and used a kind of articulated vehicles with a Jacobs truck between the car sections. They were very good looking vehicles. PCC cars were not very widespread in Latin America. Only one new all-electric car from St. Louis Car Co. with B3 trucks was delivered to Mexico City, and this served as a starter for further imports. Thus a total of 274 used cars were delivered to Mexico City and 42 cars to Tampico in Mexico. The cars in Mexico City came from Detroit and Minneapolis and were all-electric PCC's. The system at Tampico received vehicles from Toronto (air-electric), Cincinnati via Toronto, Kansas City and St. Louis (all-electric). It does not exist any more. Using parts from former PCC's, the local firm Moyada built in 1986 17 eight-axle articulated LRT vehicles (000 - 016) for Mexico City, and these were in service until the arrival of new cars from Siemens in 1990 on the "Tren Ligero" line. Details and photos of these vehicles can be found on Allen Morrison's excellent page under http://www.tramz.com/mx/mc/mc75.html, of Tampico unter http://www.tramz.com/mx/tp/tp.html, both by Allen Morrison. A border line case with regard to Latin America is the line from El Paso to Juarez (Juarez is in Mexico). This system received in 1950 20 used PCC's from San Diego, probably All-Electric, which were in service until 1974. One further used PCC, car 7078 from Baltimore, an air-electric car from Pullman Standard Car Manufacturing Co., was rebuilt in 1945 to all-electric as a test car for a new large order. The order did not materialise, and the car was rebuilt to air-electric. This caused new problems, and therefore the car was sold to Costa Rica. It arrived in November 1956 on the Northern Railway of Costa Rica. Renumbered to 189, it was requipped for narrow track for the line out of San José. It received a diesel engine and was at least in service until 1976, after having received a complete overhaul in 1975 or 1976. A total of 22 cars were delivered in1964 to a mining company in Chile, the then Anglo Chilean Consolidated Nitrate Corporation, later known as Sociedad Qimica y Mineral de Chile, even later as Soqimich and today as SQM which operates between the harbour town of Tocopilla, Maria Elena and Pedro de Valdivia in the Second Region, about 1500 km north of Santiago, between Iquique and Antofagasta, even today a large network of mining railways with a total length of 115 km. Between Tocopillo and Tigre the line is still electrified today at 1500 Volt direct current. In and around as well as between Maria Elena and Pedro de Valdivia the lines were electrified at 400-600 Volt direct current, and around these two places the PCC's operated transporting staff to and from the mines. This part of the system was deelectrified some years ago. The PCCs', air-electric cars from the series 3000 and 3100 came from the Los Angeles Railway which operated the local streetcar lines. The reason was the same track gauge of 1067 mm. These vehicles, equipped with pantographs in lieu of the trolleys, were in use until 1978. Towards the end of their career they were equipped with towing bars and drawn by locomotives, both diesel and electric. This did no good to the motors, and therefore the company fixed goods wagons trucks under the cars. A photograph can be found in the Book "PCC - the car that fought back" (see further up) on page 230, bottom. Some cars were later converted to local offices and similar things, but today nothing can be found of them. In the book "The Anglo-Chilean Nitrate & Railway Company" by Donald Binns there are several pictures. The book can still be ordered from the Swiss Fahrplancenter. Purpose of the vehicles was the transport of mine workers. Although the firm of Brill also developed in the thirties some PCC type of vehicles, the Brilliner, they did not join the production line of the PCC and sold only very few vehicles. The PCC cars being defined by the patents of their trucks (B, B2 and B3), and Brill being of the opinion that their trucks were of better quality, the Brilliners cannot be classified as PCC vehicles.
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