It's time to pay again: starting this Tuesday, July 1st, Renfe tickets will no longer be free across the country. The Spanish government is thus ending the massive discount policy it implemented three years ago due to the price spikes caused by the outbreak of the war, but some tickets are no longer free.

Mobile support for title validation has been available for two and a half years It was only available for Android devices with NFC technology — a technology for connecting devices and exchanging data in a confined environment — although the card could be recharged and consulted using all smartphones. Now, the T-mobility Wallet is already available for iPhone, a new feature that improves the travel experience for public transport users. The possibility of validating tickets directly with the mobile phone, without the need for a physical card, arrived on the iPhone on December 27 to offer greater comfort and security to travelers.

It's only been a year since he was appointed director of the Autoritat del Transport Metropolità. Before that, Manuel Valdés - an engineer by training - had spent 17 years at Barcelona City Hall, where he promoted the new bus network, the low-emission zone, the superblocks and the tram along the Diagonal. All this experience, he says, has helped him to delve into the "engine room" that is the ATM: "In the morning I want to see the message that everything is working normally."

If there is one project, apart from the serious backlog in renewables, that shows that it is time for everyone, administrations and private companies, to get their act together again to modernise the country's infrastructures, it is T-Mobilitat. The mess in the management of this change, which should bring the ticketing system up to date with most European cities, using top-up cards or paying directly with a mobile phone, is incomprehensible. The first steps were taken ten years ago, in 2012, and it has been eight years since the temporary joint venture SOC Mobilitat (formed by CaixaBank, Indra, Fujitsu and Moventia) was created. This joint venture had to specify and implement a project promoted by public administrations, which after all are the ones that take on the main cost. It would take too long to list the many delays but it is only necessary to note (as is clear in a new legal report to justify the administration's motives for a new modification - the fourth - of the original contract) that right now the roll-out date is unknown, and there is no option of going back. On the contrary, the Metropolitan Transport Authority (ATM) has had to advance up to €14.5m to the joint venture – €10.6m have already been paid since last December – to provide liquidity and allow the work to be completed. The reason is that CaixaBank, the financial partner, threatened to pull out of the project last autumn. The reasons why it finally stayed part of it are not clear, but the fact is that it has now been the administration that has advanced the money.

T-Mobilitat, the controversial project for top-up transport tickets to replace the current cardboard tickets in public transport, hung by a thread last autumn. After CaixaBank threatened to withdraw from the project, the Metropolitan Transport Authority (ATM) made a move to avoid it from happening and ensure that T-Mobilitat went ahead with the initial configuration, i.e. developed by a consortium (SOC Mobilitat) led by CaixaBank as well as Indra, Fujitsu and Marfina.

Delays in the roll-out of new public transport ticketing system T-Mobilitat have led to four changes in the awarded contract – three of them in the last two years – and huge cost overruns. There is no unanimity when it comes to specifying how much the bill adds up to (some people already put it at over €116m, double the initial price), but what had gone unnoticed by everyone was the cost of maintaining the old cardboard tickets with a magnetic stripe for longer than expected.

A new obstacle has come up in the launch of the Barcelona metropolitan area's new T-Mobilitat transport ticket. Monday's euphoria over the launch of the new website that allows travellers to register and acquire the new transport ticket has lasted under 48 hours. The Metropolitan Transport Authority (ATM) has had to quickly correct a serious security loophole that has exposed – from the start – personal data of thousands of users who registered on the website to order their new transport card.