The suspended passage over the Ter that was missing to connect Girona and Empordà by bicycle

Girona / CelràThe Ter river, before carving its path towards the Empordà plain, flows through a final narrow passage. It is the Congost, straddling Girona and Celrà, a bottleneck through which passes the road connecting to La Bisbal and Palamós (C-66), the train heading to Figueres and Portbou (R11), and also a little-known and large underground channel that supplies water to what is known as the Empordà of Gironès: the Vinyals irrigation ditch. The Congost becomes a mandatory compression point for all infrastructure. But despite the lack of space, ingenuity has made it possible that on Sunday a new path will be inaugurated, allowing pedestrians and bicycles to cross the Congost safely, separated from the intense and dangerous traffic of the C-66

After years of claims and a decade of work on the project, the suspended walkway between the Girona neighborhood of Campdorà and the municipality of Celrà is now a reality. It is a metallic structure of just over half a kilometer built in a cantilevered manner on the railway embankment that follows the Ter. Part of a longer route, 1.8 km, which for the first time safely connects the city of Girona with Celrà, opening the door to aspirations of creating a large greenway that runs all the way to Palafrugell without having to coexist with cars.

"Many mayors of Celrà had already thought of it, but the project didn't start to be executed until 2015 – recalls David Planas, the mayor of the municipality. We spoke with a landscape architect to find the best route, whether it was crossing the mountain, the river... But finally, it was seen that the best option was to hang a walkway from the train embankment." But the "ordeal" came once the permits and the project were already in place to build the infrastructure: "We realized that Adif's wall over the Ter, due to lack of maintenance, had been eaten away by the water." It was thus that after the pandemic it had to be reinforced.

Generalitat Investment

But then another problem arose: when the works were due to start, with just enough time to justify the European FEDER fund, the war in Ukraine broke out and the price of iron skyrocketed. "The company that was supposed to do it backed out", details Planas. So, they knocked on the door of the Department of Territory, Housing and Ecological Transition, considering that it was a "national work that connects Girona with Baix Empordà". The works began in July last year, were supposed to last eight months and have suffered different postponements, and a period in which cyclists and pedestrians have already passed through "despite the safety barriers and signs" warning that the work was not yet finished, in the words of the mayor. The total cost has been 2.8 million euros: Celrà has contributed half a million and the rest the Generalitat, and it has had the support of the European Next Generation financing funds.

the Campdorà plain to the Font PicantInterurban connections

Celrà's new cycle lane allows Girona to add a new interurban connection, after completing the cycle lane that runs behind the Pont Major neighborhood and connects it with the Campdorà plain to Font Picant, on the border with the neighboring municipality. It is at this point where until 75 years ago the people of Girona gathered to rest, hold parties and popular meals, and the most eager would swim in the Ter. Today the fountain is still there, with a sign and photos that recall the life the place had, but it no longer has ferruginous water. Now the aspiration is that it becomes a passageway again, but not only for leisure, but also for sustainable mobility.

Celrà argues that the cycle lane will allow many people who live in Sarrià de Ter or Pont Major and go to their industrial estate every day to commute to work. It is the route that Bernat Quintana, a municipal technician, takes between two and three times a week from Girona. It takes him 25 minutes, between 10 and 15 more than if he went by car. "I'm happy there's an infrastructure like this, because riding on the road is very dangerous, especially with so many trucks passing by," explains Quintana. However, the risk he now sees is time: "One thing that bothers me a lot about cycling is the feeling that I have to do a gymkhana, that they make me go up and down." He says this especially regarding the Pont Major section and the arrival at Campdorà. Anyway, he says that "it should be affordable to go to any nearby municipality by bike".

This infrastructure is part of the Government's Catalan Cycling Strategy, which aims to promote a network of pedestrian and cycling paths throughout Catalonia that will encourage the use of bicycles, both for daily commutes and for leisure and tourism. The goal is to have safe connections in areas with municipalities separated by less than 10 kilometers. The next one to be inaugurated in Gironès will be another one that has been demanded for more than ten years: the footbridge over the Ter river between Bescanó and Sant Gregori. The works, in this case carried out by the Diputació de Girona and the two municipalities at a cost of 1.8 million euros, have already entered the final stretch. It is a bridge of 135 meters, located 6.7 meters above the riverbed, designed to withstand a flood even greater than that of the Gloria storm in 2021, which will connect the Ter valley with the Llémena valley.

Carles Borrell, a cycling enthusiast for decades, has been closely following the works for months. Almost daily. Both these and those in Celrà. He sees the deficiencies, warns the Greenways Consortium to fill potholes, and writes memorandums for the town councils to improve infrastructure. He is excited to see that these new connections will open up new safe routes. "Cycling is life," he says. One of the new connections is the project to extend the cycle lane that has just been created in Celrà to Palafrugell. The Consortium began to conceive it with the mayors after the pandemic, and according to Planas, the executive project could begin at the end of the year.