THE HIGH-SPEED RAILWAY LINE IN BARCELONA NETWORK STRUCTURE 1.- Why will there be two stations in Barcelona (Sants and la Sagrera) and not just one (la Sagrera)? • The high-speed rail services will use their own separate infrastructure (with an international track width), replacing conventional long and medium-distance rail services. • The new network will make it possible to incorporate other regional services (trains stopping at Girona, Tarragona, Lleida, Figueres, Perpinyà, Saragossa, Valencia, Montpellier) that are essential for configuring Barcelona as the Euro-region capital. • The stops of these regional services must be near the points of origin and destination of the citizens. Forcing people to travel to one station, with the ensuing increase in time will cause them to lose interest in making short journeys. (If a trip to Girona takes half an hour by train and getting to the station takes three-quarters of an hour, there is little advantage compared to the current situation, in which passengers can catch the train to Girona at any of the four stations in the city, and the trip lasts one hour). 2.- Isn’t the number of stations excessive if we add the station of El Prat? No. The Camp de Tarragona station will be used by 500,000 inhabitants, those of Girona and Lleida, by about 150,000 inhabitants each, the station of Figueres by about 50,000 inhabitants and the three stations in the region of Barcelona (el Prat, Sants and la Sagrera) by around 4,500,000 inhabitants. 3.- Why is it better for the High-Speed Railway Line to continue passing straight through with no dead-end stations? • The best service model for Barcelona is for trains starting or ending their journey in the city heading north (Girona and international trains) to leave Sants and pass through la Sagrera; those heading south the rest of Spain and Portugal) to leave from la Sagrera and pass through Sants and for all the services passing through to stop at both stations. Stations with no continuity (such as França station) would have no future. 4.- Why is it not such a good alternative to construct the line along the Coast? • It can be assumed as an irreversible fact today, that the HSRL (High-Speed Railway Line) will reach Sants. Making Sants a permanent station in the form of dead-end would lead to it disappearing in the long term: − The trains would have to turn around with passengers on board. − Travelling time would be increased by having to make a detour of 19 km. 1 • The construction of the line along the coast poses many technical difficulties in terms of execution: a) The course of the line is quite simple between Can Tunis and Port Vell. b) The Port Vell area would have to be crossed using a tunnelling machine below sea level in terrain that is quite unstable on the same level as the coast. c) It would be necessary to pass underneath the coastal ring road and under one end of the Palau del Mar building, to avoid affecting Line 4 of the Metro network. d) A new tunnel would have to be built between Meridiana (in front of the National Theatre) and la Sagrera, crossing Plaça de les Glòries, and on the surface, since it is not possible to access la Sagrera underneath Line 2 of the Metro, which crosses the Clot district diagonally between the streets of València and Guipúscoa. e) The course would be affected by the proximity of buildings and public areas. • The drafting and processing of the informative studies, environmental impact declarations and construction projects would lead to a considerable delay of at least three or four years, i.e., it would not reach la Sagrera until 2016. 5.- Why is it not a good alternative to construct the line through the Vallès area? • Making the trains travelling between Sants and la Sagrera take a detour of 65 km, meaning an increase of three-quarters of an hour in travelling time is totally absurd. The passengers would never use the service, and the trains would be practically empty. • The High-Speed Railway Line will leave Sants, pass through el Prat and through el Llobregat until Martorell where it will continue on to Tarragona. The Vallès line, which has an international width for the transport of goods, runs as far as Can Tunis and the Port through the Llobregat corridor, parallel to the High-Speed Railway Line (HSRL) but with no connection between both. To enable passenger trains to pass from the HSRL to the goods line, there would have to be an intersection in Llobregat with lines in opposite directions, and this would lead to a considerable reduction in the driving capacity of the lines, for safety reasons. As an alternative, an intersection at a different level to prevent this problem would mean having to build long viaducts in the area of Llobregat, which has not been planned and would be completely incompatible today with the current course of the lines underneath the Llobregat bridges. PASSING THROUGH THE EIXAMPLE DISTRICT Preliminary: What is a tunnelling machine and how does it operate? 6.- What is a tunnelling machine? A machine for constructing a complete section of a tunnel. It consists of a circular disc the same size as the tunnel diameter that rotates and “eats up” the rock, earth or sand, thanks to its cutting wheels. The disc moves forwards protected by a metal cylinder that acts as a shield to prevent the earth from collapsing. Inside the shield, and before 2 the shield is withdrawn for it to move forward with the disc, the machine assembles concrete rings to form a fixed, permanent protection for the tunnel. The machine head moves forward using a set of hydraulic jacks that are supported on the surfaces already constructed. 7.- Does it require any special maintenance? Yes. Among others, the cutting wheels must be replaced quite often when they become worn. If the attack face is sandy or unstable, a mortar screen must be constructed from the surface to create a safe area for the maintenance operators. 8.- Is it necessary to access the attack face from the surface? It is advisable for there not to be inaccessible sections that are excessively long as the machine could jam when it reaches heterogeneous ground. 9.- Can the machine pass underneath houses? Yes, provided these are sections in which buildings alternative with unoccupied spaces (streets and squares) within short distances. 10- Is there any problem in passing under buildings? Yes, three types of problems: − The problem already commented on, regarding difficult access (in Santa Coloma de Gramanet the work being done on Line 9 of the Metro made it necessary to evacuate a restaurant to forma a provisional access area that was not planned). − Geometric and structural interferences (underground, extremely deep foundations). − Limiting of subsidence (slight downwards movement of the terrain). Under normal conditions, this may reach 2-3 cm above the tunnel lock. It can be limited to a few millimetres by injecting cement into the terrain. The injections must be made from a series of external wells that are close to the buildings. Conclusion: the machine is able to pass under buildings but it is advisable to avoid this. 11- Can it pass underneath a tunnel that is in service? Yes, transversally or slightly obliquely. Not longitudinally, as it is not possible to access the face without interrupting the line in service above. ALTERNATIVES FOR THE PROVENÇA-MALLORCA TUNNEL 12- Is it possible to pass along Aragó? No, this is geometrically impossible: a) There is no room for the access ramp to the new tunnel in the subsoil of avinguda de Roma, which is occupied by two tunnels coming from Aragó and plaça de Catalunya. 3 b) It is impossible to pass under the current tunnel under Aragó for the reasons given above. Laying it underneath a side, outside the “shadow” of the current tunnel would mean grazing the vertical façades of Aragó, at a smaller distance than those used in the streets of Mallorca- Provença, and in the narrow sections of Aragó (between Diagonal and Clot) it would have to be laid underneath the houses. c) The intersection under the existing Line 2 of the Metro which passes diagonally underneath the block formed by Aragó - Navas de Tolosa – Guipúscoa – Espronceda is geometrically impossible, since the depth of the new HSRL tunnel would not be sufficient for it to reach Sagrera at the correct height, due to the slope. 13- Can the height of the High-Speed Railway Station of Sagrera be lowered? No, as the new high-speed railway line local rail network is underneath it, and cannot be sunk any more than the level foreseen, between the existing tunnel of Clot and the crossing over the pipes collecting the rainwater from the Riera d’Horta which cannot be modified with respect to elevations or slopes. 14- Can the positions of the High-Speed Railway Lines and local lines in la Sagrera be altered? No, the high-speed complex, which is more than 3 km long (platforms, supplies area, workshops) cannot be situated below the water level, and then have a smaller local trains service station that is much smaller above them. Any actions affecting areas below the water level would not be accepted by the Catalan Water Board. The difficulties in constructing such a large infrastructure below the water level and pipes, and the fact of having to construct them with the current railway workshops of Sant Andreu permanently open for service would make this impossible.