Page 44 - Vía Libre Special - 25 Years of Spanish High Speed Rail

SPECIAL

years of Spanish high speed rail
A quarter century of
A quarter century of

technological development
technological development

The inauguration of the first high speed
The technologies used by the Madrid- Madrid-Seville line sowed the seed for the new
technological developments and the better
Seville line a quarter of a century ago performance achieved since then.
provided the basis for the technological and maintenance of the infrastructure and rolling

development of future high speed lines. In stock.
That experience ensured the success of the
many cases these lines have now become operational start-up of the first Madrid-Seville high
speed line, and planted the seed for the new techno-
global standards and a key export factor logical developments and better performance provi-
for Spain’s railway industry. ded today on the high speed lines which were built
and commercially launched in the following years.
Shortening of times
L speed rail is the radical shortening of journey times.

One of the most obvious advantages of high
Looking back over these last twenty-five years, quite
In the case of that first Madrid-Seville line the jour-
apart from the very substantial funding made avai-
lable, no one can question the major effort made by
Spain to ensure that the technological development ney time shrank from six and a half to two and a half
hours. In its first year of commercial operation it was
of the new lines has followed a constant and steep already a huge success, with over two million pass-
upward curve. High speed rail in Spain has been con- engers and a growing occupancy rate which reached
tinually improving its performance in terms of infras- as high as 83%.
tructure, facilities, stations, rolling stock and services. This line paved the way for the Madrid-Barce-
In 1992 the technology used was basically what lona line, a more complex corridor which was in di-
had already been developed by European countries rect competition with air travel. The need to provide
with experience in high speed rail, such as France a comprehensive service was seen as indispensable,
and Germany. At that time the decision was taken to and the decision to focus on service levels is one of
combine on the same project Spanish railway tech- the keys that drive the development of high speed
nologists and professionals with professionals from rail travel today.
technological multinationals for the design, planning, Passenger demand studies, together with ope-
implementation, commissioning, traffic management, rating programmes to optimize lines and their com-

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