(12/12/2024) 
The contract has been formalised for around 513,900 Euros, and has been awarded to the UTE (temporary consortium) formed by the companies Ayesa, Ingeniería y Arquitectura and Teirlog Ingeniería. The study will analyse different possibilities for action such as increasing the number of kilometres to be covered, reversing the route or breaking the load, including a possible direct route, without going through Zaragoza, which would allow the connection with Pau-Canfranc, estimating the economic investment and the time schedule of these actions.

Three options

According to the details in the tender specifications, at least three alternatives with different courses of action are contemplated. The Zero or minimum Alternative would consist of identifying or implementing a loading/unloading or transshipment facility for goods in the Zaragoza area, with the aim of enabling the continuity of international traffic coming down from Canfranc via the existing Iberian gauge network to Catalonia.

The Alternative 1 would be to create a space for loading, unloading and transshipment of goods in the Tardienta area (Huesca). From there, traffic would continue towards Barcelona via the Iberian gauge on the Tardienta-Lleida-Sant Vicenç de Calders line.

Finally, the Alternative 2, the most ambitious one, would consist of transporting goods directly in standard gauge without breaking the load from Canfranc to the Mediterranean Corridor. To do this, the feasibility of implementing standard gauge in the Zaragoza-Sant Vicenç de Calders route would have to be analysed. The scope of this work will be the development of preliminary studies with the necessary and sufficient level of detail to allow decisions to be made on the most suitable alternatives for this freight rail route.