International Railroad Discussion > Costa Rica: Incofer # 87

# 1: Incofer 87 (GE U11B) March 12 after a special passenger expedition from San Jose to Orotina, near the Pacific Coast.

# 2: An electric Loco spotted between San Jose and Orotina

#3 : Food service on the expedition.

It was great fun.

On the following post I will report the Costa Rican expansion news.

Walter Johnson

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Expansion of service in Costa Rica is being funded with grants from the European Union.

The EU has donated about $750,000 (As I translate the story from Spanish) to Incofer to help restore electified ROW from San Jose to the city of Heredia, about 20 KM North of San Jose. As I read the story, about half of the work has been done.

The EU has also donated about $1,000,000 to help restore non-electrified ROW from the Eastern suburbs of San Jose to the city of Cartago, about 25 KM East of San Jose.

I found 5 or 6 Electric Locomotives stored next to a warehouse in the main yard in San Jose, and one on a siding between San Jose and Oratina.

I expect that the main use of the restored ROW will be commuter service, with some little freight use.

Walter Johnson

We're planning a second trip back to Costa Rica this coming year. I want to go back to Tabacon and probably to Quepos on the coast. Is there any service to Puerto Caldera at present? I would like to maybe see about riding the rails between San Jose and the west if it's available. What could I expect to find for pax service?

Butch,,,,,hree we go

New Route for Train
March 31st, 2006
INCOFER announced this week that following Easter, a new train line will open, running from the Latina University in San Pedro to Tibas. This is the first portion of a line that will eventually run to Heredia, and it includes the construction of a 100 million colon bridge.

The new train will leave from Cuatro Reinas (Tibas), and stop in La Colima, Cinco Esquinas, Calle Blancos, the Atlantic Station, University of Costa Rica and the Latina University. The executive president of INCOFER, Miguel Carabaguíaz, stressed that the
money for the Heredia - San Pedro route is funded in a large part by a European Union donation of 667,000 Euros.

Posted in Business and Economy

There isn't any scheduled passenger service outside of the San Jose area. Incofer is running special festival trains to the West on Saturdays and Sundays 3 or 4 times a year.

I'm pretty sure that the ROW is in operation to Caldera, and so I guess they could run some of the special trains there. When I was visiting San Jose they ran trains to Oratina on 4 different weekend days, and they were all sold out.

I don't know where the other town is.

Walter Johnson