The delegate of the Government in Cantabria, Eugenia Gómez de Diego, has held a meeting with the Sustainable Mobility Bureaux of the region, with the aim of addressing the improvement of the railway transport service of Proxies.
At the meeting, Gómez de Diego agreed with the Bureaux on the need to improve the reliability of the Cerca trains, as well as on the importance of investing in infrastructure to modernize the railway network of Cantabria.
To this end, the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, through Adif and Renfe, is investing 447 million euros in different actions - some of them already finalized - among which stand out:
• The complete renovation of the line between Santander-Torrelavega, Torrelavegas-Mataporquera and between Orejo and Liérganes.
• Improved signaling, security and telecommunications facilities and the modernization of blockages throughout the network
• Track duplication between Renedo and Guarnizo, Santander and Muriedas and Astillero Orejo
"The investments that the Ministry of Transport is carrying out will allow the railway system of Cantabria to be completely transformed and substantially improve the quality of the Neighbourhoods service, making it more modern, efficient and sustainable," said Gómez de Diego.
According to him, some improvements in the service have already begun to be noticed, such as the reduction in travel times, and he has pointed out that the “great leap in quality” will be perceived between 2026 and 2027 when most of the renovation work that is being carried out throughout the network ends and the new trains begin to arrive, which began to be built last February.
The delegate recalled that the Proximity Plan designed by the Ministry foresees a total investment of 1,341 million euros compared to the 530 planned by the previous PP Government and has valued that Cantabria has “for the first time” a clear planning and a defined schedule of investments.
Finally, it has expressed its satisfaction with the “strong increase” of passengers in the Neighbourhoods network, which surpassed in 2023 the “more than 5 million passengers transported, an increase of +36% with respect to 2019. “Both the Ministry and Adif and Renfe know that they have to return the trust placed by the travelers and are working hard for it,” he said.
For their part, the Sustainable Mobility Bureaux have valued the investments of the Ministry of Transport positively, but they have insisted on the need to speed up the execution of the works and to adopt temporary measures to improve the service while the investments are executed.
During the meeting, they also called for the creation of a transport consortium in Cantabria, advocated prioritizing investments in Neighbourhoods against high speed, while addressing railway integrations, improvements on national roads and transport in rural areas.
Both the delegate and the members of the Mobility Table have agreed on sustainable mobility.