Renfe, a Spanish company with international ambitions

by time news

The moult continues. After the Italian Trenitalia, another railway company has sights on the French rails: Renfe, a Spanish railway company, thus began Monday, January 16, tests on the Barcelona-Lyon and Madrid-Marseille lines.

From Monday, Renfe is running its trains empty, with a view to opening these two lines ” before summer “, according to its CEO, Isaías Táboas Suárez. The Iberian company intends to take advantage of the falling out with the SNCF: initially, the main French cities (Lyon, Marseille and Paris) were connected with Madrid and Barcelona by Spanish and French trains.

Since 2013, a company, half-owned by SNCF and the other by Renfe, has operated these lines. But the French company abandoned this joint operating agreement for lack of profitability. “Renfe would probably have preferred to continue, but we did not find a satisfactory agreement seen from our window”then specified a leader of the SNCF at Echoes. Since then, the relationship between the two rail operators has deteriorated.

Created in 1941 at the end of the Spanish Civil War, Renfe had a monopoly on rail transport in its country for 60 years. Following European legislation, which provides for a harmonization of the management system and an opening up to competition, Renfe abandoned the management of rail infrastructure in 2004, to focus on the operation of national and regional lines.

Since 2014, it has split into four state enterprises to“adapt to the liberalization scenario in Europe”. While rail has gradually opened up to competition, its travel subsidiary manages 5,000 daily trains.

Among them, the AVE cousin of the TGV, is distinguished by its “duck” locomotives, similar to a beak. Since its creation in 1992, this high-speed train has served around thirty Spanish cities. Renfe also operates Cercanías, the suburban train network of the community of Madrid, equivalent to the RER.

Operator of the Mecca-Medina line

Beyond the French railways, the Spanish company covets other world markets. Renfe is thus the main shareholder (26.9%) of the consortium of Spanish and Saudi companies Al Shoula, which operates the railway line between Mecca and Medina, two cities of pilgrimage for Muslims.

Renfe’s “duck” trains will also run in Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. In March 2021, the company announced the acquisition of 50% of the Czech rail transport company LEO Express, present in these three countries.

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