Freight trains thru the San Pedro Valley...

 

Freight cars moving thru the San Pedro Valley toward he Dragoon Mountains East of Benson

Benson, Arizona has been home base since December, 2010. More specifically the RV park named SKP Sagauaro Co-op on the Southeast side of town. The San Pedro Valley - and the San Pedro River that gives it it's name - runs from Mexico to a location just East of Saguaro National Park. It is perhaps 135 miles from the border to its terminus to the north of Benson. The San Pedro River runs thru the valley and is kind of special: it's the only North-flowing river in the US originating in Mexico.

Not a lot going on here other than winter RV tourists... that's when the local population swells from 5,000 to about 10,000. There are ranches and small farms in the valley; they make gun powder and explosives just to the South of Benson at Apache Powder; there's some mining; significantly there is Fort Huachuca to the Southwest in Sierra Vista; and there's the railroad. 

Southeast of Benson is the small town of St David which was founded by Mormons over 150 years ago. This tiny hamlet is a center of farming, ranching and the local Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. St David was chosen because there were artesian springs which could support their farming and ranching needs. 'Were'... the water table has dropped significantly and the artesian wells have been replaced by deep wells and pumps to extract the water.

Benson would hardly be noticed were it not for the railroad the runs through town. The town was named for Judge William S Benson, a friend of Charles Crocker who in 1880 was the president of Southern Pacific Railroad. So (surprise! surprise!) Benson is a railroad town.

And that gets me (finally!) to the subject of the photo above. You'll have to look very closely to see the freight train which has passed thru Benson and is rolling across the San Pedro Valley toward the town of Dragoon. The train of freight cars starts at the lower left in the photo, does a couple direction changes then travels on to a break in the Dragoon Mountains into Sulfur Springs Valley, then on thru Willcox and points East. Unlike I-10, the railroad chose a mostly level pass through the San Pedro Valley allowing an economical solution to getting through the valley. And yes, the railroad was here long before I-10 was built.

We see mostly freight trains but there are also passenger trains that pass thru on a regular schedule.