Texas Gets Set to Own a Railroad
South Orient controls one of Texas’s seven rail crossings into Mexico and a major trade corridor south of the border. With the purchase, the resurrected line will be poised to alleviate congestion on other lines into Mexico, with the prospect of becoming a significant route for the North American Free Trade Agreement.
The pending sale comes almost a year after negotiations with a previous buyer for the railway stalled and the National Surface Transportation Board ordered the Texas Department of Transportation to find a buyer. When a buyer could not be found, the state of Texas offered $6 million to help find one.
Although final terms of the sale were not available at press time, the latest agreement calls for the state to buy the South Orient’s rights and, in turn, lease the line to Texas Pacifico Transportation Co., owned by Grupo Mexico, the majority owner of Ferrocarril Mexicano. One of the largest train companies in Mexico, FerroMex owns tracks connecting the Texas border town of Presidio to Topolobampo on Mexico’s Gulf of California coast.
