The R3 travelers are the ones who will bear the brunt of the act of vandalism that blew up Rodalies. The interlocking that burned in Montcada-Bifurcació has become the black spot that will take several weeks – up to two months according to the first forecasts – to return to normal operation. On the other hand, passengers on the Maresme line (R1) will recover the usual train service today. Those from Granollers (R2 North) and Garraf (R2 South) have already circulated normally this Monday.
The Plaza Catalunya tunnel will be open again and this will considerably reduce the widespread impact that travelers on practically all lines have suffered in recent hours, with 120,000 users whose daily mobility has been profoundly altered. The problem from today will be concentrated on the users of the R3, which only circulates from Montcada-Ripollet to the north. Between that station and Puigcerdà there will be two trains per hour in each direction and from Montcada-Ripollet to Fabra i Puig the alternative road service will be maintained using shuttle buses that allow connection with metro line 1.
R4 will also be altered when passing through the destroyed interlock area. Those responsible for the contingency plan have chosen to split the line that goes from Sant Vicenç de Calders to Manresa in two. Between l’Hospitalet and the capital of Bages there will be only two trains per hour and direction, while between l’Hospitalet and Penedès there will be four trains per hour and direction. Of course, travelers must get off when they arrive at the second city of Catalonia and take another convoy to get to Barcelona, ??either on the R4 itself or on the other lines that begin and end their journey at the gigantic l’Hospitalet station. .
For its part, the R7, which serves students at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), is supplied by the R4 to Cerdanyola and from that city to the UAB is covered by shuttle buses. The R8, which goes from Martorell to Granollers passing through the university, on the other hand, maintains its circulation without alteration.
However, Renfe warns that “the relocation of material and personnel may cause specific effects on the planned service reorganization.” The alternative transport plan prepared by the public operator and the railway infrastructure manager (Adif) could be modified depending on the recovery of operational capacity, although everything indicates that it will maintain this scheme for a few days. In the Generalitat they talk about two months, although those responsible for infrastructure prefer not to make a deadline public.
Regional services, for their part, will not be affected either in the south or in the north. It only alters normality on line R12, which stops running from l’Hospitalet to Manresa. Yes, the trains will run between Lleida and Calaf, maintaining the hourly frequencies launched this year. On the other hand, from Calaf to Manresa the service is interrupted and is provided by substitute buses.
The effects for this Tuesday represent a much less complex operation than the one deployed on Monday, when the majority of trains could not cross Barcelona and efforts were focused on guaranteeing that the lines reached stations from which they could exchange with the metro. Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona (TMB) expected the worst and went all out, removing each and every one of the available trains from the depots.
The metro company reached a record number with 167 trains in service in the Barcelona metro – 15 more than usual – in the morning rush hour, which was also brought forward and started at six in the morning. In this way, the nearly 400,000 validations registered until 10 in the morning were absorbed without major problems, only 1% above the usual numbers, a “very moderate” growth for the president of TMB, Laia Bonet. On L2 (used by R1 travelers in Badalona) the most significant increase occurred, with 7% more validations. On L1, used by R4 users in l’Hospitalet and Fabra i Puig, the increase in travelers was 4%.
Nor is it that Rodalies users switched en masse to private vehicles. Traffic entering the Catalan capital on the ring roads barely increased by 2%, while in the other accesses it even decreased by another 2%, according to monitoring data from the Barcelona Urban Police. “These are figures without significant changes in traffic and congestion,” said Bonet, also the first deputy mayor and head of mobility for the Catalan capital.
