The arrival of the Yosemite Valley Railroad in El Portal, Spanish for the Gateway, marked a major transportation achievement and the beginning of the community. In 1907, El Portal’s first building was the railroad freight and ticket office, and passengers who arrived there completed the final 12 miles into Yosemite by stage and later by motorcoach. When the railroad first ran through the Merced River Canyon on May 15, 1907, it transformed travel from Merced to Yosemite from an uncomfortable two-day horse-drawn stage ride into a four-hour sightseeing journey. Railroad travel peaked in 1916 with more than 14,000 fares recorded, but that same year more visitors reached Yosemite by automobile than by train. After the All-Year Highway opened in 1926, passenger travel dropped nearly 80 percent, a decline that eventually ended rail travel to the park.