The greatest undertaking before the country at the present time is the Pan American Railway of which little has been heard in the United States until recently, and a great many think that it is merely an idle dream. These people may be surprised to learn that it will soon be an accomplished fact so far as the North American continent is concerned. A railroad by that name has just been completed from San Geronimo, on the Tehuantepec National Railroad, in Mexico, to the Guatemala frontier, a distance of about three hundred miles. More than this, the road is already in operation and regular through trains are running to Tapachula, only a few miles from the boundary of Guatemala. As soon as the Occidental Railway of Guatemala is extended about thirty miles from Retalhuleu to connect with the Mexican line at the border, there will be an all-rail line from Canada and the United States to Guatemala City. A concession has already been granted for this line and it will be built at once by the same people who have just completed the Mexican portion of this scheme so successfully. The present line from Retalhuleu to Escuintla, about eighty miles, will become a part of the through connecting system that will be extended at least to Panama, if not beyond. This much is a certainty, and that it will be completed within a very few years is my prediction. Through trains will not be a possibility, however, unless the Guatemala and other Central American lines are broadened to standard gauge, for at present all the Central American lines in operation and in construction are built of narrow gauge width. The Mexican connecting lines are all of standard gauge construction.
A survey was made a few years ago from Oaxaca, Mexico, to the northernmost railroad connection in the Argentine Republic, and all of the Spanish-American republics are looking forward to the completion of this great scheme at some day in the future. Its construction to Panama would, I believe, be of great assistance in preserving peace and in engendering a better feeling between the states of Central America, as it would facilitate commerce among them and would give them one common interest. At present there is no railroad in any of the republics that reaches the boundary of any other, so that communication is generally by sea and through the ports.