23,000 tons of steel are piling up in Portbou due to the rail chaos: "We risk paralyzing companies like Seat"

PortbouA street less than six meters wide runs alongside the Portbou riverbank, still carrying water from the recent rains, leading to the only vehicle access point for the second largest rail freight warehouse in Spain. This 180,000 square meter facility, long forgotten and located near the French border, is experiencing unprecedented infrastructure paralysis in Catalonia these days following the accident in Gelida and the closure of the Rubí tunnel, through which freight traffic passes. 23,000 tons of steel are stockpiled in the large warehouse in Portbou belonging to the rail logistics operator Railsider, which specializes in the steel industry. Another 8,000 tons are on their way. This will necessitate storing the steel coils outdoors, as they will no longer fit indoors. They will be stored in the so-called "day yard," the rail yard where trains are parked. Operating since 1997, Railsider is the only remaining operator in the last town on the Costa Brava, but in almost three decades it had never experienced a situation like this.

"We have to load trucks and leave via this poor access road we have, so we don't risk paralyzing companies like Seat or Ford. European materials for the automotive industry come here," explains Laura Jamás, head of people and management systems at the company, while workers slowly load trucks, in a process unheard of at Rail.

They are not the only ones waiting for the rail paralysis. "We have around 4 kilometers of Iberian-gauge track in Cervera [Cervera de la Marenda, in Roussillon] filled with some 600 vehicles waiting for the green light to start leaving for Spain," details Marc Salas, head of Transfesa France, a company based on the other side of the border. They have prepared four Iberian-gauge trains to travel towards Catalonia as soon as the Rubí tunnel opens, but he admits that what worries him most is the volume of cars accumulating at the Martorell plant.

43 trucks for one train

Railsider's temporary solution for meeting deliveries is to load trucks. But the logistics are nearly impossible. Each train carries up to 1,000 tons of steel, and a truck, at most, 24. Emptying the current warehouse would require more than 958 road trips. To put it more simply: "42 trucks are equivalent to one train," explains Jamás, aware of the need to advocate for key infrastructure such as border crossings, which have been further diminished by the opening of the La Llagosta freight terminal last December. But once the truck is loaded, the other odyssey is moving it by road to the Portbou exit. The only route is the one-way Ribera street, which descends to the large platform of the Adif station, controlled by a gate laden with egg yolk, and passes under the tracks through an enlarged tunnel that covers part of the town's football field, followed by another low, 19th-century tunnel. And then the drivers still have to navigate the narrow streets of Portbou to the AP-7 motorway in Figueres, loaded with steel.

Faced with crises like these, the mayor of Portbou, Gael Rodríguez, explains that the construction of a bypass connecting the road to Llançà with the Adif terminal is more necessary than ever. The project has already been put out to tender and the preliminary study has been completed; they are now awaiting two reports.

What is the future of the station?

It's a Wednesday with clear skies and calm seas. According to the latest message from Adif (Spain's railway infrastructure manager), the Rubí tunnel should reopen on Thursday or Friday. Nearly 200 kilometers from the Gelida accident, for Railsider and Transfesa executives, as well as for the Socialist mayor, the accident should also serve to highlight a key border infrastructure project. The warehouse first lost its appeal with the opening of the AP-7 motorway at La Jonquera, suffered another blow with the opening of the high-speed, international-gauge rail line between Figueres and Perpignan, and lost even more business with the new freight terminal in La Llagosta.

"The Portbou container transshipment terminal was paralyzed on December 15," Salas explains. He never points to its motionless cranes. What will become of the station? Since 2024, Renfe has been conducting tests at the digital skills center, and the City Council is working with the Department of Education and Territory to provide vocational training in rolling stock maintenance. "The day after I became mayor, I stated in various interviews that Portbou could once again thrive thanks to the station: I said it on day one, and today I'm even more certain of it than ever," Rodríguez affirms.