Anglo-Argentine Tramways Company
Company type | Private company limited by shares |
---|---|
Industry | Transportation |
Founded | 1876 |
Defunct | 1952 |
Headquarters | |
Key people | Bernard Docker,[1] Samuel Hale Pearson |
Services | Tramways, Underground |
Owner | Sofina (after 1907) |
The Anglo-Argentine Tramways Company (Spanish: Compañía de Tranvías Anglo Argentina), known simply as La Anglo in Argentina, was a large transportation company which operated the majority of the trams in the Buenos Aires network, which was also one of the largest in the world at the time having lines totalling 875 km (544 mi) in length. The company also created Buenos Aires' first underground tram line, which would go on to become Line A of the Buenos Aires Underground. The company also owned other tramways around the country.
History
The company was founded in 1876 by
Purchase by Sofina
In 1898, the Belgian company Sofina began acquiring shares in the AATC at a time when the company was electrifying its Buenos Aires network, where the company owned 120 km (75 mi) of lines by this point, as well as the electrification of the Rosario network, which was completed in 1908. By 1907, Sofina created a new company Compagnie Générale de Tramways de Buenos Aires to absorb the Anglo-Argentine and purchase other companies in the city and already by 1909 it had become the largest transport company in Argentina.[5] The newly formed company's shareholders were made up of a number of different nationalities and included prominent European investment banks such as Paribas and Deutsche Bank.[4]
Line A
Construction of Line A of the
The original Anglo-Argentine line ran underground from
Demise
In the years following the formation of the Compagnie Générale de Tramways de Buenos Aires, they came to own the vast majority of the Buenos Aires tram network, with the exception of a few Argentine companies such as the Lacroze Company's Tramway Rural. However, increased competition from bus travel and the construction of new lines for the Buenos Aires Underground, anti-monopoly laws and a devaluation of the Argentine peso all meant that the AATC was in an increasingly difficult situation by 1930.[10]
By 1936, the company's accumulated losses had reached £2.5 million (around £92 million in 2005 money[11]) while the company was facing serious competition from the Compañía Hispano Argentina de Obras Públicas y Finanzas (CHADOPyF, Hispanic-Argentine Company for Public Works and Finances), which had recently completed Line C and was close to completing Line D. That same year, the government of Buenos Aires also began to organise public transport under a large mixed holding company known as the Corporation for Urban Transport (Corporacion de Transportes Urbanos) which was put into effect in 1938.[10]
The AATC remained largely independent, however in the post-war period, the political climate in Argentina had changed significantly and under the leadership of
The AATC's shareholders did not recognise the purchase and – together with the Corporation for Urban Transport's other shareholders – made the British ambassador to Argentine intervene on numerous occasions. Argentina and the United Kingdom then reached an agreement in December 1952 to resolve the matter of the transferral of assets quickly, however, this would turn out to be fruitless. The conflict ensued until 1963, when it was ultimately taken to the Buenos Aires Court of Appeals, which recognised that the Argentine state was partly responsible for the loss of capital of the foreign shareholders.[10]
Legacy
Though the Buenos Aires tramway network ceased widespread operations in the 1960s, along with the other cities in which the AATC operated, many remnants of the original company can still be seen. In Buenos Aires, the Polvorín Workshop still functions as the maintenance area for Line A of the Buenos Aires Underground, and is currently being put out of use and converted into a museum for the network.[9]
The original
In
Gallery
-
Construction of Line A
-
AATC employees with journalists in November 1913
-
Line A's stations remain largely unchanged from when they were built by the AATC
-
UEC Preston car exhibited in AATC livery
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AATC logo on the side of a UEC Preston car
See also
- List of town tramway systems in Argentina
- Trams in Buenos Aires
- Trams in Rosario
- Line A (Buenos Aires Underground)
- Anglo-Argentines
References
- ^ "The modern day Docker". The Steeple Times. Retrieved 27 November 2015.
- ^ Foreign Business-Host Government Relations: The Anglo Argentine Tramways Co. Ltd. of Buenos Aires, 1930–1966 (abstract) - Research Institute for History, March 1995.
- ^ Historia del tranvía en Rosario Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine - Tranvia del Bicentenario.
- ^ )
- ISBN 978-950-641-530-3. Retrieved 26 October 2015.
- ^ Tejera, Domingo (1993). Subterráneos de Buenos Aires (in Spanish). p. 11.
- ISBN 950-9575-34-8
- ^ El Subte cumple 99 años - EnElSubte, 1 December 2012.
- ^ a b El Taller Polvorín, centro de la historia del Subte - EnElSubte, 30 November 2013.
- ^ )
- ^ "Currency converter". The National Archive. The National Archive.
- ^ "Scalabrini Ortiz y la nacionalización de los ferrocarriles". El Historiador. Archived from the original on 8 December 2015.
- ^ Puesta a punto de los históricos vagones de la línea A, La Nación newspaper, 21 January 2009 (In Spanish—History includes vintage photos and video) – Retrieved 2009-02-04
- ^ Exhibieron la dupla histórica Preston para festejar el Bicentenario - EnElSubte, 26 May 2010.