ESTHER GÓMEZ Málaga
Malaga
Updated Friday, February 2, 2024-19:28
Málaga The coastal train to unclog the Costa del Sol, a historic project... and forgotten
Few things everyone agrees on - especially in these times - but the need to have a train line that connects the
Costa del Sol
is one of them. The municipalities of the province of Malaga and the Junta de Andalucía consider it a
strategic project
, businessmen see it as key to the development of economic activity and citizens understand that it is an essential infrastructure to improve the mobility of those who live in the area. Malaga coastline. However, the Government chaired by Pedro Sánchez is not clear about it and rules it out in the short term.
It is not a priority and its execution is not in the plans of the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility today. "We need clear data that indeed this - the Costa del Sol train - is necessary," stated this Friday the Secretary of State for Transport and Sustainable Mobility, José
Antonio Santano
, during his speech at the Club Dialogues for the Democracy in which the issue of "Málaga's infrastructure as an engine of territorial cohesion" has been addressed.
"With what we have on the table, we do not have data that will allow us to advance in the short term in the direction of that Costa del Sol train," said Santano, who has shown himself open to "deepening the information" regarding to this project, but facing a future for which the Government continues
without setting a date
.
Apparently, at this moment all the efforts of the central Executive are focused on the
basic trans-European network
, "which already exceeds resources" - Santano commented - or what amounts to the same, on the Mediterranean Corridor which, once again , leaves Malaga out of its route, despite having been recently modified.
The reactions have not been long in coming. From the Popular Party, its deputy secretary of Autonomous Coordination and Deputy for Malaga,
Elías Bendodo
, has harshly criticized the central government for "disregarding the coastal train and now saying that it has no data", in what he has described as a "taking of hair".
This is a project that "has been talked about
since 1979
" and whose study the Government has budgeted 8.4 million euros in the last ten years, recalled Bendodo, for whom this way of proceeding by the Executive is nothing more than another "scandalous
aggression against the province of Malaga
."
Several decades have passed since the first report on the coastal train was presented and more than eight million euros have been allocated to studies on it, its layout and viability, the last one - prepared by ARCS, Studies and Technical Services and Economic Analysts of Andalusia with financing from Unicaja - was launched at the beginning of January by the president of the Malaga Provincial Council,
Francisco Salado
, and the mayor of the capital,
Francisco de la Torre
. Also present at the meeting and who have defended the need for key infrastructure.
This report placed the emphasis on the creation of a new railway line in Malaga, a province that only has two suburban routes of 70 kilometers in length and which is far behind other Spanish cities such as Seville -5 lines and 254 kilometers- , Valencia -6 lines and 323 kilometers- or Madrid -10 lines and 370 kilometers-, although the Malaga commuter hub is the most efficient and profitable in Spain, this document highlights.