The Council of Ministers today authorised the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility to tender, through Adif, a contract with an estimated value of 41.5 million euros (VAT included) to carry out the first works of the railway integration project in Santander consisting of the diversion and provisional station of the Iberian wide network in the station of the capital of Cantabria.
The works mainly include the diversion of the conventional roads, which will allow, together with those of the new building of offices for railway use, to free the spaces necessary to execute the rest of the works contemplated in the agreement signed by the Ministry, through Adif and Renfe; the Government of Cantabria; and the City of Santander.
These works comply with the commitments established in the last monitoring committee of the agreement, as well as the works of the new building of offices for railway use, which will be tendered soon.
Both actions will be fully financed by the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, through Adif, as it involves functional and operational improvements for the railway infrastructure.
For its part, Transportes, also through the work of Adif, advances in the drafting of the project of modernization and expansion of the passenger building of the station, which will fully finance, as well as the project of reorganization of spaces within the railway complex, cofinanced by Adif, the City Council and the Regional Executive.
With these two performances, the final image of the entire performance would be achieved, which occupies a prominent place in the Proximity Plan of Cantabria.
Advances in integration
In the current beach of roads of the Santander station coexist the Iberian width and the metric width with two clearly differentiated corridors, with their corresponding facilities and buildings that physically separate them.
· The final image of the entire performance includes:
· The transfer of the beam of passenger and goods tracks of metric width;
· The remodeling of the beach of wide Iberian roads;
· The integration of all passenger services into a single temporary station;
· The replacement of the current car park;
· The urbanization of the entire area, with a liberated area of more than 36,000 m2 next to Calle Castilla;
· And the creation of a new surface of about 48,500 m2 that will cover tracks and platforms of both Iberian and metric width.
The contract that the Government of Spain now authorizes to tender, together with that of the new railway office building, includes all the operations necessary to free up the spaces that will allow the execution of all the aforementioned works, enabling a provisional corridor that allows the maintenance of the railway service while the integration actions are carried out.
Benefits and objectives of railway integration in Santander
The integration of the railway in the city of Santander will allow to materialize three objectives, with notable benefits both for users and for railway operations and the urban environment:
- Modernize and expand the station: rehabilitate the station of the conventional network (north pavilion) to unify in a single passenger building the provision of all railway services (Long and Medium Distance, Neighbourhoods and network of metric width); and build a new volume, attached to the north pavilion, that will expand the surface of the passenger building and create a new connection of the square of the Stations with the Paseo del Agua.
- Reorder spaces to rationalize the surface occupied by the beach of roads and railway facilities. The railway service will be made more efficient and spaces will be freed up to improve the integration of the railway in the city.
- Cover the tracks and platforms from the head to the pedestrian walkway that connect the streets Alta and Castilla and take advantage of the liberated land in an urban setting.