P & G RR in Puerto Rico

[Anonymous]

I am currently working in Puerto Rico and yesterday I visited a tourist operation called the Tren del Sur in Arroyo. While nosing around I found a lot of out of service cars (tank, gondola, and sugar cane) lettered P & G. Can any one provide me with some background on the original railroad?

The tourist operation has 6 locomotives (four Plymouth, 1 Mid-West, and 1 Catapillar). The Plymouth used on the trains is a three axle and the rest I believe are two axle.

[Anonymous]

Hello, I can help. I lived in Puerto Rico for eight years, four in Ponce, and four in San German. I am half Puerto Rican, but I am not a Boricua. I have managed in that time to have seen almost every town on the island at least once.

I don't know many facts about the railroad except that Arroyo is the place to learn. The railroad was built in the Roosevelt days to haul sugar cane. By the fifties sugar cane was no longer able to support the railroad because sugar beets were cheaper to use for the making of sugar. The railroad ran from San Juan west to Isabela, then south to Mayaguez, San German, then east to Guayanilla, Guanica, Ponce, Juana Dias, Santa Isabel, Salinas, Cuomo, Patillas, and Arroyo.

If you go to Guanica, there are the remnants of a train yard, and port facilities. In Ponce, down at the water front there are tracks in the streets of an old wherehouse district, and an old SW-1 switches tank cars on a car ferry.

There is much more that I can tell you, but I have to go right now !!

[ericsp]

QUOTE: Originally posted by bgoodman4

I am currently working in Puerto Rico and yesterday I visited a tourist operation called the Tren del Sur in Arroyo. While nosing around I found a lot of out of service cars (tank, gondola, and sugar cane) lettered P & G. Can any one provide me with some background on the original railroad?

The tourist operation has 6 locomotives (four Plymouth, 1 Mid-West, and 1 Catapillar). The Plymouth used on the trains is a three axle and the rest I believe are two axle.

Proctor & Gamble maybe? I know they make food, so they might have had a sugar mill in Puerto Rico years ago.

[Anonymous]

I just typed for an hour everything I can tell you about the RR, and a stupid window opened asking if I want to continue, so I clicked yes, and the @#$%^#@@#$$ erased everything !!!!!!!!!

[Anonymous]

I guess I will go in short installments.

The sugar cane was originally controlled by a consortium of American and Puerto Rican Companies. Today, it is controlled by a cooperative of farmers and the government. There are two remaining refineries on the Island, today sugar is refined for medical alcohol and rum. The one open to the public is the Bacardi refinery in Mercadita ( Mehr-sa-deeta), just east of Ponce. It is owned by the Serralles ( Sehr-ah-yes) family that also once owned all of the surrounding land, and a beautiful castle - Castillo Serralles overlooking Ponce, just below the vigilant cross - Cruz vigilante. You can take a tour of the plant and there are still tracks in and around the plant.

[Anonymous]

If you follow highway #1 east from Ponce, as you pass through towns, you will notice a frontage road in places, that is the old right of way of the RR.

Going east, just after Mercadita, There is a bridge that was orriginally for the RR, then it was highway #1 for many years, but now is abandoned, the new road runs just north.

In Salinas ( Sah-leen-ahs), near the race track, there is something that I never quite figured out. It is some kind of stationary boiler on stilts, and a ramp, with several tracks. I suspect it was stop for locomotive servicing though.

If you head north into the fields anywhere along highway #1 or #3, you can find grade crossings and sections of track.

In Salinas, the highway has also been moved to the north, if you follow the old #1, you can see the frontage road.

[Anonymous]

In Ponce, there used to be a large train station on Calle Ferrocaril - railroad street, and Avenida Hostos. It is long gone though, a fifties style Sears and Roebuck is there now, which is now a hardware store. There are still tracks in the street though.

Down by the waterfront are tracks in the street in the old wherehouse district. The SW1 can be found over by the modern port section.

[Anonymous]

Heading west on highway #2, out of Ponce, the highway squeezes between the ocean and the cliffs, The original highway#2 and the RR right of way are buried under the new highway.

In Tallaboa ( taya-bowah), there are many signs of the RR, even though the refinery and the industrial complex post date the RR.

If you head south on back roads from Guayanilla ( gway-ah-niya ), and Yauco
( ya-oo-coh), you can find ruins of abandoned sugar refinaries and train tracks.

[Anonymous]

In Guanica ( Gwa-neekah), you will hit pay dirt !!!! check a map how to get to Playa Santa, because it's on the way there, the west side of the bay from town, there is a trainyard, and remnants of a locomotive facility, shops, and port. Guanica is the deepest port on the island. It is also where American Marines landed in 1898. If you follow the road east out of town you will find a beautifull beach - Cana Gorda ( Canya-gorda), Playa Santa is also a beautifull beach, about waist deep for thirty yards out warm and clear, a good beach for kids, and is surrounded by restaurants with fresh caught seafood.

[Anonymous]

It is getting late and I am making too many mistakes trying to type. I will post more tomorrow. I will tell you where to find a place that the railroad once barely squeezed between the ocean and high cliffs and then turned inland through a tunnel in sheer rock. The tunnel opens on the other side to a beautifull beach with a bar, music, dancing, and romantic lookout.

[Anonymous]

I'm back. I don't know how much all this will mean to anybody who is not in Puerto Rico, but I will continue.

I last mentioned Guanica, the RR headed west from Guanica over a ridge to the Lajas (la-has) valley. Lajas valley can be pretty dry, Puerto Rico can be pretty amazing because of its "micro climates". Even though the island is only about 130 Mi. east to west, and 75 Mi. north to south, It has definate climatic regions. Anyway, Lajas valley is pretty dry, but is used mostly for cattle grazing, and driving along any of its back roads, you can see barbed wire fences with peices of old rail used as posts.

[Anonymous]

Highway #2 passes through a pass over a ridge that the RR went around to the west and then followed what is highway #102 to San German.

In San German (sahn-her-mahn), there is a restored train station and an inspection car. They are on the bypass that goes around the town to relieve traffic going to the university. If you follow #102 - Luna street through town, you will see a city that has changed very little since the 1800's.

[Anonymous]

Heading north out of San German on #102, this is the RR's original right of way. I suspect there was a diverging line heading south and west to the old center of Cabo Rojo and then to Mayaguez.

Anyway, following the #102 north, you'll be heading through fields of sugar cane. Along the side of the road you will see stationary jibs that were originally used for loading the train, but today are used for loading trucks during harvest time.

If you dig old trucks, you will love PR, During harvest you can see tons of old Autocars, Diamond Reo, and Mack B-series, pulling staked trailers piled increadibly high with cane. Detroit 6-71s wailing.

[Anonymous]

Harvest time is pretty amazing. Sugar cane is not like corn, it doesn't grow in neat rows. It gets to be about eight or ten feet high and is an impenetrable mass as far as the eye can see. Sugar cane grows on marshy land, and in the tropical heat, is swarming with critters. It must have been increadibly dificult in the old days when it was cut by hand.

Before it can be harvested, it must be burned. This kills all the critters and burns off the leaves, the stalks are about 1 1/2" thick and hard so they don't burn. During harvest time the sky turns brown with smoke and the wind carries soot.

[Anonymous]

So, continueing north along #102, when you get near Lavadero, on the west side of the road there is an old girder bridge that is a RR bridge.

Continueing on towards Mayaguez (maya-gwez) passing under the #100, there is an abandoned train station. You will recognize it because it looks like the station in San German.

[Anonymous]

I have heard that there was a large train station in the old center of Mayaguez, but I don't know where it was. San Juan, Ponce, and Mayaguez are the three main cities in PR.
In the port area and by the tuna plant (stinky!!) There are lots of tracks in the street.

Heading north on highway #2, leaving Mayaguez, and entering Rincon (reen-cohn), there is a large bridge that was originally the RR, then #2, and now abandoned.

In Rincon, there are several beautiful beaches, an old lighthouse, and an abandoned nuclear power plant. You can find a lot of english speaking poeple here because of the nearby military base, and the surfers that come from all over the world.

[Anonymous]

From here north the coast line is pretty rugged, but inland is even more so, so the RR had no choice but to hug a rocky coastline, as it headed north to Aguada and Aguadilla (agwa-diyah). Both of these towns are at the bottom of steep rocks, and squeezed into a narrow strip along the ocean. The train ran through the waterfront streets in these towns.

[Anonymous]

We are now at the extreme northwest tip of the island. Here the RR sqeezed the last little bit north along a narrow right at the foot of high cliffs just above crashing waves. The cliffs come to a point, on the other side of the point is a crescent shaped beach, and a way up following a ridge. Before reaching the point, the RR passed through a tunnel in shear rock. Today this right of way is a park, and the beach is called tunnel beach. You can get there by taking the highway #2 north to Aguadilla. If you climb a hill and round a curve to the east passing a giant American flag and view point, you went to far, although the viewpoint is pretty cool. there is an exit at the bottom of the hill, it's easy to miss.

[Anonymous]

After Aguadilla, I don't know of any other remnants of the RR. The north coast of the Island is pretty irregular, and inland is very rugged land, what is called Karst formations, where the land is pockmarked by giant sinkholes. As late as the 50's poeple in PR were pretty geographically separated even though they live on an island because the terrain is very difficult. The train basically followed the north, west, and south coasts. The east coast of the island rises 6,000 ft straight out of the ocean, and is impassible. This geologic feature actually determines the weather. Hurricanes hit the east side of the island and are forced to the north and on to the Bahamas, Florida, or Hispaniola and Cuba; or forced to the south in to the Caribean sea.

I wish I knew what P&G stood for, maybe Patillas and Guanica.

[Randy Stahl]

That is one of the most thourogh descriptions you can ask for, I've never been to PR but it sure seems like it now. Any one want to talk about the North shore or the Milwaukee Electric Ry & light Co.?

[Anonymous]

The SW1 can be found in the register of short lines. The line it is on is VERY short, five or six parallel tracks fifty yards long and a fuel tank, just enough to park the tank cars and unload.

The old trucks are still all over but during the economic boom a few years back, there was a rash of new equipement on the island, my uncle is a truck dealer and did very well, nontheless, they are starting to disappear.

I have to add that it is a real shame that Puerto Rico's railroad has disappeared. Because PR is an island, economic changes have immediate effects. For this reason, so much of the RR disappeared immediately, yet after fifty years, much can still be seen. It would be very cool to be able to vacation on a tropical island AND railfan !! Maybe in Cuba, or Hawaii.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Randy Stahl

That is one of the most thourogh descriptions you can ask for, I've never been to PR but it sure seems like it now. Any one want to talk about the North shore or the Milwaukee Electric Ry & light Co.?

Those are both names of the same RR? There are a lot of parks that used to be interurban line where I grew up in Cleveland.