Following a weekend in which all commuter and regional trains across Catalonia had been suspended since 1pm on Saturday ‘until passenger safety could be guaranteed’, Monday began with fresh disruption on the Rodalies commuter rail network in the region, creating chaos yet again for many travellers. ALSO READ: All commuter and regional trains suspended in Catalonia ‘until safety of citizens can be guaranteed’.
Following two separate incidents early on Monday morning, train services were operating again from around 8.30am.
According to rail operator RENFE, both incidents took place at the Centralised Traffic Centre run by infrastructure manager Adif, which is based at the Estació de França in Barcelona.
Services had initially started as scheduled at around 6am, with alternative transport options made available on certain sections of the network.
However, at approximately 6.30am, the first incident forced a suspension of services. Trains were later halted again following another problem at Adif’s control centre.
Just after 7am, services began to restart gradually, but the recovery was short-lived. Before 7.30am, trains were once again suspended.
Speaking to Catalunya Ràdio, RENFE spokesman Antonio Carmona said technicians were working to prevent a repeat of the issue and stressed that ‘there will be time to determine the causes’.
He also explained that whenever there is an incident at the control centre, rail traffic is stopped ‘for safety’.
At 8.01am, Rodalies posted on X: ‘[There is now] progressive recovery of the Rodalies de Catalunya train service since the incident at Adif’s traffic control centre has been partially resolved.’
The chaotic restart of services on the Rodalies network sparked confusion and anger among commuters.
Subscribe to the Weekly Newsletter from Spain in English.
Please support us with a donation.
Click here to get your business activity or services listed on our DIRECTORY.