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Argentine president: More government involvement needed to repair railroads
The privatization of TBA put the concession operators in a position where they cannot borrow money to invest as they do not own the trackage, which would be a standard form of collateral. Argentina was forced into privatization by the IMF plans of the 1990’s, sadly, it was largly a failure. They need a national reinvestment to rebuild the network, that will likely come from China if nowhere else. Argentina should be operating 100 car unit trains and modern diesels, but they are stuck with obsolete equipment and trackage held together by packed earth.
Prior to the IMF directing the gov’t to privatize the railroads, they were already in a shambles under government control. The gov’t still wanted to keep its meddlesome hand in the domination of the rail system, but ostensibly privatized, hence the mess it is in today and thus the politicians now claim they have the solution.