Railroad Car at Summit Botanical Garden

Did you know that the train car at Summit Botanical Garden has more history than you might imagine?

In 1966, the Panama Railroad faced a problem: its passenger cars were very old, many still made of wood. The solution was to bring new cars from the United States, specifically from the Reading Company in Philadelphia.

But there was a catch: they couldn't be used as-is. They had to be modified, even changing their wheels, to adapt them to the Panamanian track gauge, which was wider than the American standard.

When they arrived in Cristóbal, they sported an elegant blue and gray design with the Panama Railroad logo. Over time, they changed appearance several times: yellow with light blue, blue with red, and finally gray with green.

In 1998, with the closure of the railroad, these cars were abandoned at various points like Balboa, Summit, and Gamboa. Years later, after the modernization led by the Panama Canal Railway Company, an important decision was made: to preserve one of these cars as a symbol of all that history.

Today, that car rests at Summit Botanical Garden, allowing us to travel back in time and discover what railroad transportation was like in another era.