Beyond the traffic problems inherent in the railway network, last year it became clear that moving on foot, with reduced mobility, a stroller, or a wheelchair through Rodalies stations was often an insurmountable obstacle course. In March 2025, more than half of the elevators (52%) and almost half of the escalators at Rodalies stations were not working. "The situation was absolutely unsustainable, undesirable, and inadmissible," assures the Minister of Territory, Sílvia Paneque. According to the Government, Renfe, and Adif, this situation of "neglect" has now been reversed.

A new scare related to railway works has caused the precautionary evacuation of about eighty residents of Trinitat Vella, in Barcelona, as reported by La Vanguardia and confirmed by ARA. According to municipal sources, shortly after 3:30 AM this morning, residents of three buildings located at numbers 75-103 of Pérez del Pulgar street, near the area of the collapse in Montcada i Reixac a few days ago, called 112 after noticing vibrations and movements in the buildings. "Everything was moving as if it were a small earthquake. It wasn't a simple vibration," explains Beni, one of the affected residents, who assures that the episode generated concern among the residents.

Lines R13, R14, R15, R16 and R17 of Rodalies are accumulating delays that may exceed 30 minutes since Monday morning due to a technical incident between Sitges and Garraf stations. The disruption originated from a train breakdown, which was stopped until passengers were transferred to another train. Once the transfer was completed, the train was able to resume service. In addition, Rodalies also reported an infrastructure incident on this same stretch. Although the forecast was to gradually recover schedules throughout the morning, the affected lines continue to not return to normal, and at 3 PM in the afternoon, delays of more than half an hour are still maintained.

The three lines affected by the collapse of the tracks this Wednesday in Montcada i Reixac are now running again. The R2, R2 Nord, and R11 have resumed service this Sunday morning between the stations of Sant Andreu and Montcada i Reixac, which had been stopped since the collapse of one of the shafts from the works to bury the tracks on the border between the two cities. Temporarily, a speed limit has been set on the affected stretch.

Three days after the collapse that on Wednesday swallowed a crane at the R2 line's underground works, Adif and Renfe have announced key steps to restore traffic on the affected tracks, but without yet specifying when the R2, R2 Nord, and R11 will return to normal operation. This Saturday at noon, Adif declared the sinkhole repaired after finishing filling the hole that opened on the border between Barcelona and Montcada i Reixac with concrete. Once all safety checks were completed, Renfe began conducting empty test runs, with empty trains, before restoring service.

A worker who was carrying out maintenance on the train tracks near Sant Mori (Alt Empordà) died early this Saturday morning. According to police sources, he suffered an electric shock while maintaining the railway line, halfway between the Sant Miquel de Fluvià and Camallera stations. At the latter, Adif has been carrying out works for some time. The victim is a 66-year-old man.

Alongside fires and heatwaves, this is also proving to be the summer of transport construction incidents: in a short time, we've had two sinkholes and an explosion. If winter was marked by the tragic accidents in Gelida and Adamuz, now, fortunately so far without loss of human life, we are suffering surprising ground collapses in major public works. What is happening to us?

A blockage in the connection well of the works to bury the R2 line, on the border between Barcelona and Montcada i Reixac, swallowed a large crane and more heavy machinery this Wednesday at noon, but it did not cause injuries. Adif sources explained to ARA that no personal injuries were registered as a result of the incident, but the sinkhole has forced to to preventively interrupt the railway traffic between Montcada i Reixac and Sant Andreu without a specific restoration date, with affectations on R2, R2 Nord and R11.

A year ago, the Generalitat de Catalunya, the Ministry of Transport, the City Council of Figueres and Adif seal the agreement to move the Figueres train station from the center, currently the commuter and medium-distance services arrive at the high-speed train station site, next to Vilafant. The plan, with a total investment exceeding 150 million euros, foresees the construction of a railway bypass and the unification of all train services on the outskirts, to the northwest of the city, in a single intermodal station. This will allow the dismantling of the tracks that cross the urban center at ground level, which cause mobility problems due to level crossings and disturbances to nearby houses. The project's drafting has already been awarded and work is progressing according to the planned schedule.

One cold and one hot at the works that Adif has underway on the Catalan road network. The work on the Garraf railway tunnels has finished a week earlier than planned and will be able to reopen next Monday the 8th. On the other hand, the infrastructure manager has reported that the R3 works are being extended again: the first phase, which was due to open last May, will not be completed until the end of the year.

"Oh, it's difficult to say when the works will begin. It's a complex, very important and strategic line for the country. The urban planning part has been done since 2010 and now we will have to start with studies and projects. It won't be tomorrow; these infrastructures cost". These are statements by the Minister of Economy, Alícia Romero, to Catalunya Ràdio about the macro-project that has been decisive to unblock the approval of the budgets: the orbital railway line. ERC wants to reactivate a plan that has been in a drawer for twenty years to give its "yes" to the accounts. In fact, the Republicans present it as a future bet for a network that this year has experienced an unprecedented crisis and is still trying to recover some semblance of normality.

New chapter in the investigation to clarify why two trains collided in Adamuz, in the province of Cordoba, on January 18, an accident that caused 46 fatalities. If last week the Civil Guard pointed out that the main hypothesis was a track break that occurred 22 hours before the incident without any Adif system detecting it, this Monday evening the company managing the railway infrastructure in Spain has corrected the police force. Specifically, Adif's president, Pedro Marco, has assured that the Civil Guard did not correctly interpret the technicalities on which it bases its conclusion that the rail was already broken.

It was the worst moment of the railway crisis. There were disruptions on practically all lines, multiple daily alerts indicating problems with Rodalies (commuter rail) and more speed restrictions than ever. Users were at their limit and, to top it off, the train drivers went on strike. All this happened last February, when the Rodalies service experienced one of the most complicated moments in its history. Far from what users perceived, however, the statistics compiled by Renfe to analyze delays point in another direction: according to the operator, in February trains had an average delay of only 2 and a half minutes. speed restrictions than ever. Users were at their limit and, to top it off, the train drivers went on strike. All this happened last February, when the Rodalies service experienced one of the most complicated moments in its history. Far from what users perceived, however, the statistics compiled by Renfe to analyze delays point in another direction: according to the operator, in February the trains had an average delay of only 2 and a half minutes.This is reflected in theMonthly Report on Commuter Rail Service Punctuality that Renfe prepares for all autonomous communities each month. It specifies that the delay is 2 and a half minutes if all trains are taken into account (punctual, early, and delayed) and that, if only the trains that are late are taken into account, then the average delay climbs to 26 minutes. But how is it explained that the month when the network worked worst, with a train drivers' strike included, the trains were delayed so little on average? Renfe explains that this statistic only takes into account delays that are "attributable to the operator and over which Renfe can act to improve", and not any other external element, such as all infrastructure incidents, for example. In fact, Renfe's figures indicate that if only problems arising from the operator itself are taken into account, 90% of trains were delayed by less than five minutes. On the other hand, if all circumstances are added up, only 16% of trains arrived on time. "The publication of this data – continue the operator's spokespeople – is a further step in the transparency policy that no other operator is undertaking," they point out.The company's own president, Álvaro Fernández Heredia, explained it this way in a message responding to the spokesperson for the Dignitat a les Vies platform, Anna Gómez, on the social network X.

It was one of the reasons that generated the most warnings from train drivers during the peak moments of the railway crisis: the number of trees that fell on or very close to the train tracks has forced Adif to cut down 13,680 trees between January and March. The rain and wind storms Harry and Ingrid exposed the weakness of the Catalan railway network in the face of meteorological inclemencies, and this is reflected in Adif's statistics. Of the total trees felled during this period, the infrastructure manager removed 8,380 as part of its usual vegetation control plan and an additional 5,300 trees as part of the emergency plan for the storms. The most affected area was the Maçanet-Portbou route, in the north of the country.

The Civil Guard has fewer and fewer hypotheses on the table to try to find out why two trains collided in Adamuz, in the province of Córdoba, on January 18, an event that caused 46 fatalities. In fact, the Spanish police are now practically only investigating one of the hypotheses: a track breakage would have caused a derailment of an Iryo train traveling towards Madrid, which collided with an Alvia train that was moving in the opposite direction at that time.

The tragedies in Adamuz and Gelida in January, which caused 47 fatalities, cast doubt on the entire Spanish railway system, not only because the accidents called into question the maintenance and safety of the network, but also because since then train travel has not been the same. In Catalonia, Rodalies still suffers from line closures, speed restrictions and service delays, and high-speed journey times have lengthened. Trips from Barcelona to Madrid now take half an hour longer due to the system, and there are unexpected delays and stops on the tracks without anyone providing any explanation to users. The reason is the speed restrictions imposed by the ministry – especially on the Zaragoza-Calatayud stretch – following incidents reported by train drivers. What complaints are we talking about? Were there more incidents than usual after Adamuz? Did the labor dispute between the Semaf union and the ministry, which ended in a strike, have anything to do with it? And more importantly, what actions has Transport taken to resolve the state of the infrastructure? ARA made a transparency request to the Spanish government to clarify these points, but the request has been rejected. In other words, the public administration has refused to release this information, and the Communications Department of the Ministry of Transport refers to the official response given through the transparency process.

The southern commuter rail corridor, one of the most strained sections of the Catalan rail network, continues to face setbacks. This March, it was announced that one of the key projects intended to improve train capacity and flow on this section of the R2 South line—the quadrupling of the tracks between Castelldefels and El Prat—has been stalled once again and is now pushed back to well beyond 2030. The reason? A change of heart by the Ministry of Transport has sent the project back to square one: the initial administrative procedures must begin anew, rendering the original timeline meaningless. Adding these tracks to the R2 line is considered one of the most significant actions in the Commuter Rail Plan in terms of improving capacity in this area. The project is not new; it first appeared in the 2020 Commuter Rail Plan. In mid-2024, with Adif's approval, the construction project was drafted. At that time, the work was considered simply an "expansion" of the existing infrastructure, which technically allowed bureaucratic steps to move forward.

A technical issue at the Adif station in Sant Vicenç de Calders, Tarragona, is currently causing disruptions on seven Renfe commuter rail lines: R2 South, R4, R13, R14, R15, R16, and R17, according to both companies. The rail infrastructure manager, Adif, explained that the problem affects the infrastructure that controls signaling, track switches, and train movement at this location, and that technicians are working to restore the system and return the network to normal. Meanwhile, on the R2 South line, service is suspended between Cunit and Sant Vicenç. On the R4 line, the disruption is between El Vendrell and Sant Vicenç. The interruption on the R14, R15, R16, and R17 lines is between Torredembarra and Sant Vicenç, and on the R13 line, between Roda de Berà and Sant Vicenç.

The latest Commuter Rail Plan, the most up-to-date, is almost 300 pages long. It's the document that details all the railway works planned from now until 2030 to improve the Catalan network: it explains what they consist of, specifies their cost, and establishes a timeline. These range from the most ambitious projects, such as the Sagrera station, the doubling of the R3 line, and the undergrounding of the Montcada station, to much smaller, faster, and even cheaper projects that can significantly improve the network's capacity. One of these smaller planned projects is in Tordera. It's classified under the section of "strategic" works programmed to "improve network capacity" and involves building a siding in front of this station, on the section of the R1 line between Blanes and Maçanet-Massanes. "This section is single-track, without sidings, for a length of more than 15 kilometers," the plan notes. "To facilitate the resolution of incidents that may disrupt the normal operation of the line, it is proposed to reinstate the siding and platform formerly in use at Tordera station," the document continues.

International freight transport faces another setback. Emergency repairs underway in the Rubí tunnel, an infrastructure project on the route to France, will force a closure for almost two months starting this Friday. This marks a new chapter in the difficult recovery underway on this section of the line since the outbreak of the rail crisis following the commuter train accident in Gelida, where a driver was killed. The Rubí tunnel was closed for almost two weeks between the end of January and the beginning of February, when emergency work began on the most critical points of this more than 900-meter-long infrastructure project, inaugurated in the 1980s to divert freight traffic away from Barcelona. Specifically, work is being carried out on a 120-meter section where a large crack needs to be repaired.