Towards the new railway
In 1979, the first "Program Contract" was signed, an agreement by which the State provided the necessary economic resources for exploitation and investments while RENFE committed to improving the quality of its services and developing a plan that would allow its recovery.
In the 1980s the question of the economic profitability of the network was raised. Based on the fact that 68% of rail traffic was carried out on 5,000 of the 13,500 km of track in the network, a plan was developed within the program contract agreed with the government, known as cerrojazo, to close those lines that were not economically profitable, largely forgetting the social profitability of the railway. In January 1985, when Enrique Barón was Minister of Public Works, 914 km of railway were closed, affecting 12 lines and 132 stations, while another 933 km were maintained for exclusive freight service. Some of the affected lines were the Santander-Mediterráneo, Valladolid-Ariza, Plasencia-Astorga, Almendricos-Guadix, La Fuente de San Esteban-Barca de Alba, Jaén-Campo Real, Valencia-Liria, Calatayud-Valencia, etc.[48][49][50] For their part, the autonomous communities came to the rescue of another 600 km to avoid their closure.[51] In some cases the reports relating to the losses of these lines contained manipulated or false data, such as adding electrification workers to lines that did not have it, and thus justifying their closure.[49].
With the new political system, the FEVE company, which at the beginning of the 1980s was still suffering a serious crisis, gave up ownership of several of its lines to some regions. The first was Catalonia, where the Ferrocarriles de la Generalitat de Catalunya (FGC) entity was established in 1979. In the Basque Country, Euskotren was created in 1982, followed by Ferrocarriles de la Generalidad Valenciana (FGV) in 1986 and the Servicios Ferroviarios de Mallorca (SFM) in 1994, organizations that received the management of narrow gauge, tram or suburban railways as some autonomous communities received powers in this matter. For its part, during that decade FEVE undertook a profound renovation of material and infrastructure, focusing its services on commuter trains and local trains. Starting in 1983, a tourist train began operating, the so-called Transcantábrico, which would end up becoming a star service.
In 1983, the Madrid Railway Museum was inaugurated, based in the old Delicias station, although since 1967 there had already been a Railway Museum in the Fernán Núñez Palace. Years later, the Railway Museum of Catalonia would follow, located in the town of Villanueva y Geltrú (Barcelona) and inaugurated in 1990. In the following years, new museums followed, opening throughout the country. The tourist train modality was also launched, in an attempt to attract the public to the railway beyond commercial services. In this sense, the so-called "Strawberry Train" stands out, a commercial name used to refer to a special service that travels between Madrid and Aranjuez with historical material.[52] In the area of the Riotinto Mines, the old mining railway was rehabilitated in the early 1990s for recreational use within the so-called tourist mining railway.[53] This train uses the two oldest steam locomotives in Spain that are currently maintained in service,[54] as well as other types of historical material.
In 1986-1987, the Rail Transport Plan was approved, which aims to achieve speeds above 200 km/h, for which works were carried out to improve the lines. In this sense, the main objective is to achieve the establishment of a double track at 200 km/h in the Madrid-Barcelona-Valencia triangle, the one with the greatest support. Another of the main actions provided for in the plan is the construction of a New Railway Access to Andalusia (NAFA), for which the government will make a fundamental decision: in 1988 it decides that the NAFA and the new High-speed lines that will be built from now on will be in UIC gauge (European gauge). In 1990, the construction of the NAFA continued, whose arrival partly involved the reorganization of the old stations in Seville or Córdoba. In the Seville capital, the new Santa Justa station was built to concentrate rail traffic in Seville, while the San Bernardo "Old San Bernardo Station (Seville)" and Plaza de Armas "Seville Station-Plaza de Armas (MZA)" stations were dismantled. A large part of these works carried out in the city of Seville had another reason: the celebration of the 1992 Universal Exhibition (Expo'92). In Barcelona there was a reorganization of the network of tracks that circulated through different areas of the city, as well as the improvement and adaptation of the Barcelona-Término station (renamed as France station). In the case of Barcelona, the works were related to the 1992 Olympic Games. The Madrid-Seville high-speed line was inaugurated on April 14, 1992, coinciding with Expo 92, and commercial service began seven days later.
In Madrid there would also be reforms in the city's stations, especially in Atocha, which at the end of the 80s began to show signs of saturation and shortage of facilities. Between 1985 and 1992, a major remodeling project was carried out under the direction of architect Rafael Moneo, which consisted of the construction of 2 completely new high-capacity stations: the Puerta de Atocha and Atocha-Cercanías stations. While the Atocha station was closed for the works, its traffic was absorbed by the Chamartín station. In 1993 the old North Station "Estación del Norte (Madrid)") was closed and after extensive renovations, it was inaugurated as a new transport interchange, renamed Príncipe Pío.
Changes in customs, with the growth of the urban population and especially in the peripheries, cause suburban traffic to increase dramatically, which would lead to the need for significant investments. Thus, an important Cercanías service began to be developed in the most important cities of the country: during those years the current networks of Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Bilbao and Málaga were inaugurated.
The application of European directive 91/440, which imposed the Liberalization of rail transport in Spain, and economic efficiency, meant that the company was subdivided into several business units. This meant the disappearance of the territorial organization model that had been maintained in RENFE since its creation, with the division of its administration by zones. Mercancías&action=edit&redlink=1 "Commodity and Logistics Services (Renfe) (not yet written)"). On December 30, 1998, the company Gestor de Infraestructuras Ferroviarias (GIF) was founded, a public business entity that was created due to the rail transport measures that the European Union began to promote based on Council Directive 91/440/EEC on the Development of railways. Community Railways. Among other issues, this directive established the separation between the train operators and the infrastructure manager. The rolling stock and its exploitation remained in the hands of RENFE, although it was planned that any private company that requested it would circulate on the railway lines. GIF would precisely be in charge of starting the construction of the Madrid-Barcelona high-speed line that year.
The emergence of the AVE
In April 1992, the first high-speed line in Spain, the Madrid-Seville line, was inaugurated. This infrastructure is integrated into the works to promote the development of southern Spain and the Universal Exposition of Seville in 1992. The name of this new infrastructure, which is built with international European gauge, is AVE, Spanish High Speed. The AVE can reach 300 km/h.
The Infrastructure Master Plan, which was launched in the 1990s with a period of 15 years, launches, apart from the maintenance of the basic network, the extension of the high-speed network of international width. The next line to be opened, not without controversy and problems, would be the Madrid-Barcelona line, which would be followed by the construction of the Madrid-Segovia-Valladolid line, with the Sierra de Guadarrama tunnel, and the branch line to Irún-France, which will be known as the Basque "Y", as well as the union of this with the Madrid-Barcelona line in Zaragoza. We can also highlight the arrival of the AVE to the Valencian Community crossing Castilla-La Mancha, as well as the continuation through Andalusia arriving at Malaga. On June 16, 1997, the Euromed service began operating, a new high-speed service for Iberian gauge that operated on the route from Barcelona, Valencia and Alicante.[55].
The arrival of the 21st century
El 3 de junio de 2003 tuvo lugar el grave accidente ferroviario de Chinchilla debido a la colisión frontal de dos trenes cerca de la estación de Chinchilla, un nudo ferroviario situado en el municipio castellano-manchego de Chinchilla de Montearagón, que acabó con la vida de 19 personas y dejó unos 50 heridos.[57].
En noviembre de 2003 se publicó la Ley del Sector Ferroviario, que da visos de realidad a la liberalización del sector y que implicó el fin del monopolio del transporte ferroviario que imperaba en España desde finales de la guerra civil. De acuerdo a la nueva legislación, el 31 de diciembre de 2004 el Gestor de Infraestructuras Ferroviarias (GIF) se volvió a integrar en RENFE y a las 00:00 del 1 de enero de 2005 esta desapareció y fue sustituida por dos nuevos organismos: Administrador de Infraestructuras Ferroviarias (ADIF), que será el encargado de administrar la gestión de la infraestructura y realizar las inversiones para la construcción de nuevas líneas, y Renfe Operator, in charge of the transportation of passengers and goods, in competition with other companies.
On July 3, 2006, a train accident occurred on the Metrovalencia network, when a convoy with about 150 people on board derailed on a curve near the Jesús station, killing 43 people and injuring 47. of the history of Spain.[58].
The construction of the High Speed lines continued and in some cases they were completed: In 2005 the La Sagra-Toledo high speed line was inaugurated, replacing the old Iberian gauge line; At the end of 2007, the Madrid-Segovia-Valladolid high-speed line, the Córdoba-Málaga line and the Lérida-Tarragona high-speed section were inaugurated. At the beginning of 2008 the first AVE trains arrived at the Barcelona-Sants Station, ten years after the works began. In 2010, another major project was inaugurated, the Madrid-Levante high-speed line. The debut of this new railway involved the entry into service of new stations adapted for AVE services: the Valencia-Joaquín Sorolla Station or the Cuenca-Fernando Zóbel Station.
Since April 2012, the Madrid-Burgos direct railway, which in recent years had been in clear decline, stopped providing service along its entire route due to rock falls that ended up causing the closure of the line.[59].
Ferrocarriles Españoles de Vía Estrecha (FEVE) was originally exempt from the new scenario, although on July 20, 2012 the Government of Mariano Rajoy agreed that it would become extinct on December 31, 2012, dividing into two as had happened with RENFE: The infrastructure was transferred to Adif, and the operation of the railways to Renfe Operadora.[60][61].
Due in part to the economic crisis, in May 2013 the Ministry of Public Works decided to suppress 48 Medium Distance lines operated by Renfe that were not economically profitable and that were accumulating deficits.[62][63] Other Iberian gauge lines have suffered in recent years a drastic reduction in the frequency and quality of their services, especially those that affect Extremadura. He also highlighted the partial closure to traffic that the direct Madrid-Burgos railway suffered in 2011.