Abstract: In 1977, when the American historian David McCullough wrote a book called: ”The Path Between the
Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal, 1870-1914”, about the social and geographical environment
during the Panama Canal construction, he described the transisthmic railway as a complement of the
engineering department that French’s company did not know how to take advantage of, because with
the Californian gold fever decadence and with the Canal works it would not have had any commercial
purpose other than the ridiculous price of passenger tickets. He never imagined that 100 years later this
complement will be a key fact in the supply chain of the Latin-American and worldwide trade.
In this paper, we will focus in the logistical map of America, where Panama is the centre. Being the
way to connect Asia and America, also both coasts of the American Continent, and the begin/end place
of four of the five Feeders highways of Latin America, it turns in the link with the others and with the
rest of the world. But they are separated by 76 kilometres that a logistical system converts this distance
into a one-hour travel to the next connection.
The challenges of this system are raising everyday as result of di erent regional trade facts. The
Panamanian complex is playing an important role with the trade balances, the growing economies and
transoceanic services with stop in Panama, generating disequilibrium (empty containers problem). The
empty containers must follow the empty container cycle since the container is emptied and the customer
returns it to the owner, it’s taken to the depot for maintenance, step that is mandatory in order to return
to the cycle of export.
