Óscar Puente estimates the maintenance of the railway network at 1.8 billion annually, the "most urgent and pressing" problem of his ministry

The conservation of transport infrastructure has become the main problem of the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility. Minister Óscar Puente has recognized that improving the railway network and the quality of service constitutes the "most urgent and pressing" problem of his ministry. In fact, it estimates that it is necessary to allocate some 1.8 billion euros annually exclusively to the conservation of railway infrastructure. This was stated during his speech at the New Economy Forum this Monday.

That the crisis in the network has escalated so much is largely due to the "drip-drip" supply and "with too many problems" of the new rolling stock ordered in previous mandates, according to Puente. "The trains are already arriving," he assured, which together with the combination of new infrastructure, maintenance and renewal of the fleet will allow the railway's reliability and capacity to be progressively improved.

With the investment, the department's strategy aims to balance the investment effort between high speed and conventional networks, where the high density of circulation multiplies the consequences of any breakdown, according to the minister. "Every time there is an incident, the impact is greater," he noted. For example, the Torrejón de Velasco node, a saturated point through which up to 298 trains pass per day and where any specific failure generates a chain impact on thousands of users. He also referred to the situation in the first years of the Madrid-Seville AVE, when the line had six trains a day and wide margins between circulations, and compared it with the current situation.

Puente has recognized that the railway system is especially vulnerable to factors such as fires, cable theft, extreme weather events and exploitation incidents themselves. However, he has assured that Spain's punctuality levels continue to be comparable or higher than those of other large European countries.

Despite the criticism, Puente has defended that in Catalonia, after the more than 600 incidents caused by DANA, the ministry allocated 200 million euros in emergency works that allowed the conditions to be reduced to 14 during the following storm. In Madrid, planning contemplates a 40% increase in the capacity of line C-5.