Page 4 - Vía Libre Special - 25 Years of Spanish High Speed Rail

SPECIAL

years of Spanish high speed rail
T

Towards the end of the 20th century the Spanish railway system was in dire
need of modernization. The economy was enjoying strong growth and Spain’s
entry into Europe set the country on a path which promised a qualitative step
forward for Spain in every aspect. At that time the railway network was old,
with low speeds and little double-track operation. Many lines served areas
with relatively low populations and there were bottlenecks at the entrances to
major cities where long-distance, freight and suburban line trains competed
for the insufficient train paths available.
Of all the countries of our environment with similar characteristics,
Spain had the lowest speeds, the fewest main lines with double track, the
least dense network, and was in the worst state of repair. Add to this the fact
that Spain’s different gauge made it difficult to link up with the rest of the
Europe we had just joined, it was clear that a far-reaching modernization of
the railway network was not merely advisable; it was a matter of survival. It
was no longer enough to make piecemeal improvements to the network or
the rolling stock.
With regard to services, after many years of
dominance the railway network had begun to lose
The first traffic and was left out of development plans for

the 1960s, which concentrated on roads and the
automotive industry. Meanwhile, a large number
of railway lines were axed (over one thousand two
25 years 1992) and steam trains were largely replaced by
hundred kilometres were closed between 1970 and

diesel trains, as neither the electrification of the
network nor the conversion to alternating current
of the AVE (the system preferred by other countries) were
given priority. On all major routes the journey time
was at least 20% longer by train than by car, and it
was impossible to compete with air travel. In 1987
nearly half the long-distance rail journeys were
made during the night, in old trains with average
speeds in the order of 65 km/h. This resulted in
some very low market shares and, what was worse, those shares were falling
for both passenger and freight transport.
Under these circumstances it seemed obvious that if the railway were
to survive it needed to be revamped and brought in line with the new demands
for mobility, modernization, and external openness.
At that historic moment there appeared a new solution, high speed,
which had the potential to address those needs. In France in the 1970s it had
already been discovered that modernizing the existing network to handle 200
km/h trains was not only extremely expensive but also insufficient to compete
with air travel over distances of more than 450 kilometres.
The delay in modernizing the Spanish railway system therefore
turned into an opportunity. The latest high speed system could be deployed,
making it possible for it to keep pace with Spain’s new phase of growth and
development.
It is often the case that when investment in infrastructure is delayed
it allows more advanced technologies to be deployed when it is eventually
renewed. This was precisely what happened 25 years ago, as opposed to what
had happened after the Civil War when new railway lines were open (Madrid-
Burgos, Cuenca-Valencia, Zamora-Ourense), operating at speeds typical

4 Vía Libre • Special 25th Anniversary of the AVE Edition