The Buenos Aires subway, famously known as the “Subte” is one of the most storied subway networks in the world, and one of the most interesting, depsite it’s relatively short network.
It is not surpising that in what was then known as the “City of Trams”, where then-visiting French prime minister Georges Clemenceau quipped “one gets the impression that the Porteños (residents of Buenos Aires) use the tram even to go to the bathroom”, the first line of what would become the current “Subte” system started out as an underground tramway.
The first various abortive projects for an underground railway system for Buenos Aires had come around in the latter two decades of the 19th century, but it’s only during the early years of the 20th century, as tramway ridership had grew beyond infrastructure capacity, with no sign of slowing down, that the first serious proposals for a subway system in Buenos Aires were made, cemented by the reconstruction of Plaza de Mayo and Plaza del Congreso and the construction of the new palace for the Congress (Argentina’s parliment), all along Avenida de Mayo, in the context of the country’s independence centenary. After many and various applications, in 1909, the concession to build an underground railway system was awarded to CTAA – the Anglo-Argentine Tramways Company, a behemoth created by British and Argentinian capitals, and later acquired by a Belgian investment firm, that operated 80% of Buenos Aires’ sprawling 850Km-long network and 3000 out of 4000 cars of the city’s tram fleet. The concession included four lines total – the first, running east-west under Avenida de Mayo, from the Casa Rosada in Plaza de Mayo (Argentina’s presidential palace) to Plaza Misere (serving the Once railway station), a north-south second line connecting Retiro and Constitution stations, two major railway termini, a third line from Plaza de Mayo to Belgrano and a fourth line from Plaza Once westwards, to Plaza Primera Junta.
Work on the first line began in September 1911, and less than two years later, on the 1st of December 1913, the first section of Buenos Aires’ “Subte” was inaugurated, running between Plaza de Mayo and Plaza Misere, becoming the first subway in Latino-America and Spanish-speaking world (Madrid’s Metro would follow six years later). Five months after the opening, on the 1st of April 1914, the line was extended further west, “absorbing” the planned fourth line trackage, to Rio de Jainero station, and on the 1st of July, the line reached it’s terminus, Caballito station (currently Primera Junta), where a ramp to street level allowed the “Subte” trains to continue their runs over the tramway network – indeed, as the line was concieved as an underground tramway, it’s trains were tram-like single cars, built in Belgium by La Brugeoise and Nivelles, and the whole line was built with a functionally “tramway-like” approach, with very closely-spaced stations and line-of-sight operation.
Buenos Aires’ first true subway line would arrive about 15 years later, and would be the product of another group of private investors, this time spearheaded by the whealty Lacroze family, whose fortune had been made by Federico Lacroze, a true “old-style” railway tycoon who had built the Buenos Aires Central Railway (FCCBA), and among other things, had also built the first of Buenos Aires’ tramway lines, and much of it’s early network. This project, whose concession had been awarded by the government while the Anglo-Argentine Tramway Company was busy building it’s own line, called for the construction of a line running from the Federico Lacroze terminus of the FCCBA to the central post office, running under Avenida Corrientes, on an alignment largely parallel (about 580m to the north) to the CTAA’s line. This line was of interest to FCCBA and the Lacroze group as their Buenos Aires terminus had been built much later than other railways, and as such, was in a much less favourable, peripheral location – a fast connection to the center of the city was thus deemed vital for the company’s business.
After some years, the financing agreement was signed in 1927, and the line was quickly built, with it’s first section being opened between Federico Lacroze and Callao stations on the 17th of October 1930. Owned and operated by the “Buenos Aires Central Terminal Railway” (FTCBA, or simply “Central Terminal Railway”), a FCCBA subsidiary, the line’s was radically different from the CTAA’s – it was powered by third rail, rather than overhead wires, ran much deeper and used a block signalling system (albeit greatly simplified) rather than on on-sight operation. Much of FTCBA’s equipment was also imported from or based on United States practice, including the rolling stock, station escalators and token-operated turnstiles (latter two being the first implementation of their kind in Argentina).
Another major difference was in loading gauge, with FTCBA’s tunnels allowing much wider rolling stock – this was because the line was also intended to be used by freight trains to the port of Buenos Aires and the “Mercado de Abasto” market near Carlos Gardel station. Indeed, after the line was extended eastwards twice, first in June 1931 to Carlos Pellegrini station, then to it’s current eastern terminal of Leandro N.Alem in December, the connecting ramp from the “mainline” FCCBA trackage to FTCBA’s underground line was opened in June 1933. Freight conveyance trough the FTCBA would however be short-lived, as the rather high passenger numbers demanded very high service frequencies.
However, the FTCBA was an “unforseen” addition to Buenos Aire’s planned subway network – the four-line plan that had been awarded in concession to CTAA still stood, but with a slight catch – after the 1929 Wall street crash and financial crisis, CTAA had no financial means left to build the other planned lines – the north-south “second line” and the diagonal “third line” from Plaza de Mayo to Belgrano, and thus, the project had remained stalled for about 20 years.
It is at this point in time that Rafael Benjumea y Burín, Count of Guadalhorce, makes his entry in the history of the Buenos Aires subte. A rather unsavory character, minister of Pubblic Works during the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera in Spain and with strong links to the various emerging european fascist dictatorships, he was living in Argentina on self-imposed exile at the time, after the failure of the “Sanjurjada” coup d’etat against the newly-proclamed democratic Spanish repubblic, to wich he was a co-conspirator, and for this, had been sentenced in absentia to a lenghty prison term.
Eyeing an opportunity to claw the stalled concessions from CTAA, togheter with a number of like-minded associates, the Count of Guadalhorce founded the CHADOPyF – the “Hispano-Argentine Company for Pubblic Works and (their) Financing” in 1930, intending to take over construction of the rest of the planned network. Unlike the financial behemots that were the CTAA and the Lacroze group, CHADOPyF had essentially no funds, and to raise the necessary capital, the Count resorted to a rather unconventional methord – selling obbligations to Spanish emigreés in Buenos Aires by appealing to their “patriotism”, mostly trough the usage of speeches heavily loaded with nationalistic rethoric. Amazingly, this worked, with Spanish emigreés from all walks of life and social classes purchasing CHADOPyF’s obbligations. With enough capital raised, and the concession being successfully re-awarded by the government from CTAA to CHADOPyF, the company began construction of it’s first line – the north-south link between Constituiton and Retiro stations – Buenos Aires’ two main railway termini.
The first section of this line, from Constitution to Diagonal Norte opened on the 9th of November 1934, and was completed fifteen months later, being extended to Retiro station. The first section of CHADOPyF’s second line, planned to run diagonally from Plaza de Mayo to Belgrano, would open shortly after in June 1937, with a very short inital section between Catedral and Tribunales stations. It would be then later gradually extended, station by station, to Plaza Italia thruought 1938. Further work was also being done on it’s third line, wich would’ve connected Constitution station to Jujuy, running under Avenida San Juan.
However, CHADOPyF’s effective takeover of Subte construction (having effecitvely doubled the network lenght on it’s own) didn’t sit too well with CTAA, wich used it’s financial and political power to strike quite a deal for itself – with the Roca-Runciman trade agreement between Argentina and the United Kingdom, where the UK agreed to give preferential import treatment to Argentine products, Argentina in exchange, among other things, agreed to consolidate all the various transit operators in Buenos Aires (the CTAA, FTCBA, CHADOPyF and the myriad of small bus and group-taxi operators) into one big entity, the “Buenos Aires City Transport Corporation” (CTCBA), and place that entity essentially under full control of British investors. With this, the whole “Subte” network was swiped away from FTCBA and CHADOPyF (wich crucially, remained without means to pay it’s creditors and had to declare bankruptcy) and functionally put under control of a CTAA “with another name”.
The full takeover of the Subte network by CTCBA came on the 19th of June 1944, and on the next day, the 20th, the “Corporation” opened the first section of CHADOPyF’s third line, from Constitution to General Urqinza – wich had been fully completed by CHADOPyF some two years earlier, but could not operate! However, this consolidation also bought a number of positive changes, firstly a proper line naming system based on letters was introduced, assigned in chronological order for each line’s opening – the CTAA line became “Line A”, the FTCBA line became “Line B”, the CHADOPyF Constitution-Retiro line became “Line C”, the Catedral-Plaza Italia became “Line D” and the newly-opened Constitution-General Urquinza became “Line E” and secondly, fare integration was finally brought into the network (whereas before, the three separate and rival operators had different, incompatible fare systems).
However, the opening of Line E would, ironically, be CTCBA’s only major Subte expansion, as the debt-ridden company was declared insolvent already in 1948 and placed under state administration initially, then fully nationalizing the network under the “General Administration for Buenos Aires Transit” (AGTBA). In 1963, after the privatization of bus services and the dismantling of the tramway network (a process started and largely completed during the CTCBA tenure), only the subway was left under state ownership, entrusted to the “Buenos Aires Subte Pubblic Corporation” (or SBASE).
The first major extension to the network in two decades came to be in 1966, with Line E being redirected from Constitution over a new alignment to Bolivar station near Plaza de Majo (part of a triple station complex that also included Peru on Line A and Catedral on Line D). From this point onwards, the expansion of the Subte slowed down significantly, due to the various financial woes of the city of Buenos Aires and the whole country of Argentina. Line E would be extended westwards by one station (José Maria Moreno) in 1973, and after the 1976 military coup d’etat (where Isabél Peron, who succeded her husband, Juan Domingo Peron, upon his passing two years earlier, was ousted by the military junta headed by Jorge Rafel Videla), network expansion ground to a screeching halt, as the vast majority of funding was redirected by the military junta towards freeway construction.
In 1979, the militart junta handed SBASE (and thus control of the Subte) over to the city of Buenos Aires, wich soon began a process of modernisation, absolutely necessary due to the obsolescent infrastructure, as no major investments in the network had been made in the past twenty-five or so years. As part of this modernisation effort, expansion works resumed, albeit slowly, new “standard” trains for the whole network were introduced in 1980 – the Fiat-Materfer cars, built locally in Argentina by Fiat-Materfer (a subsidiary of the italian Fiat Ferroviaria) with AEG components and new signalling and traction equipment made by Siemens was installed. However, while started in earnest, the modernisation efforts were severely curtailed by the successive economic crisis caused by the Falklands war and the junta’s (famously) infamous economic mismanagement.
Only with Argentina’s return to democracy, between 1983 and 1985, did the Subte modernization and expansion really pick up pace – between 1985 and 1986 Line E was extended four station westwards to it’s current terminus, Plaza de los Virreyes, and in August 1987, the first section of the “Premetro” light rail network opened, running from Plaza de los Virreyes southwards, and “feeding” Line E. However, the worsening economic crisis and hyperinflation once again curtailed the modernisation and expansion of the network. Replacing Raul Alfonsin’s in 1989, the new incoming administration of newly-elected president Carlos Menem launched an aggressive and unscrupolous privatization process (whose main victim were, among other things, the state-owned Ferrocarriles Argentinos).
Even SBASE wasn’t left unschated by this, as the pubblic company was included (at the auspices of the then-Mayor of Buenos Aires, Carlos Grosso) in the list of entities to be privatized, and thus was forced to hand over it’s operations on a concession basis, retaining only the management of it’s network and planning of extensions – wich were to be financed by the (cash-strapped) city. On the 1st of July 1994, Metrovias – a private entity formed by argentine and american investors (among wich Morrison-Knudsen and the Burlington Northern railroad) – took over Subte operations from SBASE, becoming the latter’s (unwelcome) partner for the next 30 years.
It is at this point that the most hectic period in the Subte’s history begins, as Metrovias, in order to replace decrepit rolling stock, began acquiring massive amount of second-hand subway trains from Japan, starting with the 300, 400 and 500 Series trains from TRTA’s Marunouchi Line in Tokyo, wich were intended to replace the decrepit 65-year old rolling stock dating back to Line B’s opening. Extension works also resumed at a timid pace, with the two-station northwards extension of Line D to Jose Hernandez opening in November 1997.
Line D’s current northern terminus, Congreso de Tucuman, was reached in April 2000, with a large acquisition of withdrawn 250, 300, 700 and 1200 Series trains from the Nagoya Municipal Subway being made to operate services over the extension. 2003 saw the extension of Line B to De Los Incas, and in 2004, the first properly modern trains for the Subte were procured, built by Alstom as part of it’s “Metropolis” family and entering service on Line D.
October 2007 saw the opening of the first section of Buenos Aires’ first entirely new subway line since the opening of Line E 63 years earlier – this being the Once-Caseros section of Line H, a badly needed “tangential” line in an extremely radial network famously centered on Plaza de Mayo. In 2008, Line A was extended west by two stations, to Carabobo and in 2010 Line H was extended to Corrientes station on Line B.
2013, the centenary year of the opening of the Subte, saw three lines being extended to their current termini – Line H reached it’s current southern terminus of Hospitales in May, Line B was also extended to it’s current terminus of Juan Manuel de Rosas, providing an interchange with the busy Mitre Line commuter railway and in September Line A was extended to the current western terminus of San Pedrito. In the same year, the La Brugeoise et Nivelles cars that had been in service since the opening of Line A were finally retired and replaced, just a few months short of their centenary in service!
Line H reached it’s current northern terminus of Facultad de Derecho in May 2018, and on the 3rd of June 2019, the lastest extension of the Subte was opened, with Line E being extended from Bolivar to Retiro, interchanging with Line B and providing a relief for the busy Line C. In December 2021, the nearly-thirty-year-long Metrovìas tenure came to an end, with the operation concession being awarded to the Emova Movibilidad company (part of the argentine Emilio Rogge Transporte group).
As of today, the Subte totals 56,7 Km in lenght subdivided between the six lines (A, B, C, D, E and H) plus an additional 7,4 Km of the “Premetro” light rail system (Line E2), a tiny lenght for a city with a core population of three million and a sprawling metropolitan area of twelve. Besides the expansion efforts – two additional lines (F and G) are in the pipeline – Buenos Aires’ and SBASE’s (wich remains the entity in charge of managing the network) effort nowdays primarily concern the necessary modernisation of the infrastructure of the network, as most of the Subte still primarily relies on equipment, especially in terms of signalling and power supply, built and installed when the various lines were opened – thus for the major part in the 1930s. Rolling stock is also a pressing concern, as, trough the various second-hand acquisition and the “fossils” that have remained in service far, far beyond their expected (or even concievable!) lifespan, the Buenos Aires subte has had one of the most diverse (and ageing!) fleets out of all subway networks of the world, with trains acquired from Tokyo, Nagoya and in more recent times, Madrid, “rubbing shoulders” with rolling stock purchased by the CHADOPyF back in the 1930, or even older stuff (such as the afromentioned La Brugeoise et Nivelles cars of Line A).
This has started to change in the more recent years, as most of the “oldest” stuff was retired and replaced by sizeable quantities of decently modern rolling stock, purchased from Alstom and CRRC. However, replacements haven’t kept up with retirement, thus currently the fleet still remains quite stretched, especially on Line B, the busiest of the network.
Trivia #1:
After his “Argentine venture” with the CHADOPyF, and the demise of the Spanish Repubblic in the civil war (wich cancelled the prison sentence hanging over his head), Rafael Benjumea y Burín made his return to Spain in December 1947.
As a reward for it’s political loyalty, and due to his experience in the field, upon his arrival he was immediately appointed as the head of RENFE – the spanish national railways – by dictator Francisco Franco himself. During his tenure, the Count of Guadalhorce would oversee the introduction of the Talgo II trains and the Fiat-made “TAF” express diesel multiple units, and would keep the position as the head of RENFE until his death due to an heart attack in September 1952.
Trivia #2:
The Subte was the protagonist of a very symbolic event during Argentina’s democratisation after the dissolution of the military junta that had taken power in 1976. On the 10th of December 1983, as the democratically elected representatives and senators made their return to the palace of the Congress for the first time in a number of years, they choose to do so by riding the Subte, Line A specifically. For the occasion, a preserved UEC-Preston car, No.3, dating from the line’s opening in 1913, was used. No.3 is still in preservation, and operational – it is now entrusted to the care of AATE – the preservation group of Buenos Aires’ tramways and subte cars, wich also operates the historic tramway loop around the Polovorìn workshops in the Caballito neighbourhood of Buenos Aires.
Bonus Image:
The Subte, in it’s over-a-century-long history has seen it’s fair share of notable users. One of these, from 1998 onwards, was Jorge Mario Bergoglio – future Pope Francis – but at the time Archbishop of Buenos Aires. This picture, dating between the late 1990s and early ‘2000s portrays him alighting a La Brugeoise et Nivelles car on Line A. These would be retired in January 2013, just a few months short of their 100th year in service, and two months short of Bergoglio’s election as Pope in March.
