By Mariana Martinez
A pilgrims Peninsula.
From the dim light of dawn come clanging of wheels, metal and smoke; the train arrives. From its core come women, children and men, families that join their whispers to those from the station vendors:
— Pork skin, bean or sausage gorditas, what can I get you?
— Tongue tacos, chimichangas, quesadillas…
— Taxi?
In the middle of the Baja Californian landscape, the anxious porters help the families with their boxes, trunks and bags, in which they bring there roots and hopes.
A train wagon
The Sonora-Baja California railroad was built under the initiative of the Transit and Railroad commissioner, Ing. Ulises Irigoyen, during Lázaro Cárdenas Presidency in 1937. Threatened by the expansionist views in the United States, México feared for their Baja California territory. Far away from the capital, with precarious communications and little population, the peninsula seemed a likely target; something was needed to bind it to the rest of the country.
Several railroads were being built around the country, so Irigoyen came up with a plan to build one in Baja California, starting in Mexicali and going all the way down to Benjamín Hill, in the state of Sonora, from there, the tracks could hook up with the rest of the Mexican railroad system, all the way to Guadalajara.