The railway connection between Madrid and Andalusia faces the Todos los Santos bridge interrupted and without a Renfe alternative that would allow mobility between both communities to be recovered. Wednesday's tragedy has left an exceptional situation in one of the busiest railway corridors in the country. And the problem worsens on the eve of a weekend in which thousands of people planned to travel between the center and the south of Spain.
The railway company reported that it could not launch yesterday the alternative transportation plan that it had announced to serve travelers affected by the line cut. The earliest date for its entry into operation will be Tuesday, November 3, after the Spanish Union of Railway Machinists (Semaf) has demanded that the regulatory deadline of 96 hours be respected to modify the service graphics.
The company has committed to informing before November 3 of the schedules, routes and services available, as well as the final start date. For now, users still do not know how they will be able to complete their train journeys while high speed remains interrupted.
The size of the device that was planned gives an idea of the volume of mobility affected. Renfe had scheduled 107,083 seats on its high-speed and long-distance services between Madrid and Andalusia – to which must be added the 20,000 suppressed by Ouigo – from today until Monday, November 2, distributed across 307 trains. The planning included reinforcements in the connections with Cádiz, Málaga, Seville and Huelva.
The company has enabled special services by conventional route to connect Madrid, Ciudad Real and Puertollano in both directions, although these routes increase travel time by approximately one and a half hours.
The plane, for its part, gains prominence, but cannot absorb all the demand. The companies have reacted by increasing their frequencies and the capacity of their flights, although the reinforcement does not eliminate the difficulties in finding tickets on dates of high demand.
Iberia has incorporated eight additional flights for today, with 1,760 more seats than initially planned on connections with Seville and Malaga. It has also replaced part of the aircraft with larger capacity models. Between Wednesday the 28th and yesterday, the airline will have offered 3,280 extraordinary seats, 47%.
The company has also established a price limit for its flights to and from Andalusia until November 8: 99 euros each way in tourist class and 149 euros in business class.
Air Europa has also reinforced its routes with Andalusia. It has added a daily frequency to Malaga and another to Seville, and plans to incorporate an additional connection with the capital of Seville on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays.
The road does not offer a simple answer either. Socibus has made more than 3,500 extraordinary seats available to travelers to connect Madrid with Córdoba, Seville, Huelva, Cádiz and Andújar, in Jaén. The demand has been immediate: on Wednesday it mobilized 72 buses, 38 heading to Andalusia and another 34 towards Madrid, and the available seats were sold out in a matter of minutes.
The company is working to maintain a device of similar dimensions over the next few days, with an expected supply of between 3,000 and 3,500 seats per day, which will vary depending on demand. However, the availability of vehicles and drivers conditions the response capacity, to which is added the operational space of the stations. In addition, traveling by road requires more time, a factor that also affects the plans of those who need to reach Andalusia.
Some travelers are choosing to rent a vehicle, but this alternative is not free of difficulties, especially due to the availability of cars at a time when there is already a lot of demand for the long weekend.
Price consultations carried out by Cadena Ser on Thursday placed one-way rentals between Madrid and Seville at a minimum of 170 euros from the capital and 190 euros from Seville. For their part, the sector's employers and Europcar assured El País that they had not raised their rates due to the accident.
Car sharing has also been added to the options. Platforms such as BlaBlaCar have recorded an extraordinary increase in supply and reservations between Madrid and Andalusia, although availability and prices depend on each driver.
