San Antonio's spookiest urban legend might be headed for the small screen. Celso Hurtado, the local author behind the novel The Ghost Tracks, says Blue Beetle and Cobra Kai star Xolo Maridueña is working to produce a television adaptation of his books, built around the city's long-running tale of a railroad crossing haunted by the ghosts of children.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Maridueña is producing the small-screen adaptation of Ghost Tracks, adding it to a resume that includes his breakout role as Miguel Diaz on Cobra Kai and his history-making turn as Jaime Reyes in 2023's Blue Beetle. Hurtado, a San Antonio author, has described the involvement as deeply meaningful, saying it was special to have someone like Maridueña see something in the story and want to bring it to the screen.
The project, mentioned in a September 11, 2026, Hollywood Reporter interview before MySA's October 8, 2026, report, would draw from both The Ghost Tracks, published in 2021, and its follow-up novel The Devil's Promise. Both books follow paranormal investigator Erasmo Cruz and are being explored together for a potential TV adaptation, though the project has not been greenlit. Hurtado says he is excited about the opportunities a book, or a possible adaptation, could bring to spotlight San Antonio.
A Legend Rooted in a Real Railroad Crossing
Ghost Tracks is a real place — a set of railroad tracks on San Antonio's South Side at the intersection of Villamain and Shane roads, according to the same MySA report. The crossing has inspired generations of urban legends, ghost stories and spooky tales, and Hurtado has called the legend quintessentially San Antonio, saying he wants more people to see the city's own identity, culture and stories reflected on screen.
The legend itself is associated with a school bus allegedly hit by a train in 1938, killing everyone aboard. As detailed by mySA in an earlier report, the story holds that the ghosts of those children will push a stalled car to safety if it's parked on or near the tracks, and that motorists who sprinkle talcum or baby powder on the backs of their vehicles can later find small handprints left behind.
But that same report frames the story as an urban legend that's been debunked rather than a verified local tragedy. The report also notes that the street names associated with the legend actually belong to the grandchildren of Mr. McCreless, the developer behind the nearby McCreless Meadows neighborhood, not children killed in any crash.
Separating San Antonio Folklore From a Utah Tragedy
The historical crash most often tied to the legend didn't happen in San Antonio at all, according to News 4 San Antonio. That outlet reports the accident actually took place more than 1,300 miles away, just outside Salt Lake City, Utah, where a train struck a school bus on Dec. 1, 1938, killing driver Farrold Silcox and 23 students. A Dec. 2, 1938 headline from the San Antonio Express-News — reading Bus-Train Death Toll Likely To Go As High As 30 — is cited as one source that may have helped the story migrate into local folklore over the decades.
The legend has already made the leap to film once before. It inspired the 2006 horror movie Fingerprints, according to mySA's earlier coverage, which depicted the ghosts of children pushing cars dusted with baby powder off the tracks and leaving small handprints behind. That film starred Leah Pipes, Kristin Cavallari, Sally Kirkland and Lou Diamond Phillips, and was filmed in Oklahoma with an estimated budget of about $500,000. It remains available to stream on Apple TV and Tubi.
Publisher Has Long Pushed for Hollywood's Attention
Behind the scenes, Hurtado's publisher has reportedly been angling for exactly this kind of opportunity. Inkshares, which published The Ghost Tracks, and its CEO Adam Gomolin have been pushing for Hollywood to take interest in the story, per the MySA report. Hurtado says he's grateful that Maridueña and his team are interested in bringing Erasmo Cruz's story to life.
Maridueña's involvement comes as his profile continues to rise; he attended the U.S. premiere of Practical Magic 2 in Los Angeles on Aug. 31. No network, streaming platform, cast beyond Maridueña, filming schedule or release date has been confirmed for the Ghost Tracks project, and whether an eventual series would adapt only The Ghost Tracks or also draw from The Devil's Promise remains unclear. For now, San Antonio readers — and the ghosts said to linger at Villamain and Shane — will have to wait and see if the legend finally gets its full television due.
