Argentina, a country without trains? Territorial dimension in the process of reestructuring the rail service (1957, 1980 and 1998)

Abstract

Since early in the 90’s Argentina has implemented a number of policies which aim at reducing State participation and regulation over national economy. This has meant privatizing many of the State’s assets. As from 1991, National railroad services have been given in concession to private administrators. The privatization of railroads has caused structural changes in the organization of the service and in the size of the infrastructure being used. Despite having a strong impact at the time, there is little information available concerning this transformation process. The aim of this research project was to create a number of indicators through which it would be possible to measure the territorial transformations which occurred after the concession of the service to private firms and to provincial states. To this purpose we have used information available in sources which include the whole country at three different moments: 1957, 1980 and 1998.