With the idea of building a port in Fonsalía (right in the middle of the only cetacean sanctuary in the European Union) or expanding the Tenerife South airport on hold, a new megaproject is reigniting the debate in island society: a train to the south , an idea that is not new but that is reborn from time to time, when other multi-million dollar construction initiatives get stuck. The fuse was lit again at the end of January, after Citizens presented a motion in the Island Council to promote this construction as a measure to improve mobility and ease traffic on the island.
The train in the south of Tenerife is a “crazy” investment that would take 30 years to recover, according to Sí Podemos Canarias
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The idea soon had strong detractors, such as Sí Podemos Canarias, who recalled that approving the southern train meant crossing one of the red lines established with the PSOE and Ciudadanos in the government agreement for the investiture of Pedro Martín (PSOE) as president. insular. Environmentalists from Ben Magec have also run against it, cataloging the initiative directly as “nonsense”.
On the other side of the coin, the Canarian Coalition, PP and Ciudadanos parties affirm that the train is a boost to island communications. It is also supported by the Federation of Builders of the island (Fepeco) and the Hotel and Non-Hotel Association of Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera and El Hierro (Ashotel), which applaud the announcement of a new work that will cost billions of euros. Both entities were also the main defenders of the port of Fonsalía and the expansion of the airport.
In the center, the Socialist Party, with Pedro Martín at the head of the island institution. The president of Tenerife, whose party supports the works, has not now given them the support that he has always shown, especially during his time as mayor of Guía de Isora. In the insular plenary in which the motion was debated, however, the party assured that it was not the moment to face this macro-project due to its very high cost (about 2,500 million euros) and when it is coming out of an economic crisis and health caused by COVID-19.
The southern train, chronology of a debate
The debate came on this occasion to the Cabildo de Tenerife at the hands of Enrique Arriaga (Cs), island vice president and councilor for Roads. The Yes We Can group reminded the PSOE that supporting this proposal was crossing one of the red lines of the investiture pact.
In the plenary session held at the Cabildo, the rejection of Sí Podemos and the lack of support from the PSOE ended up leading Arriaga to withdraw the motion without it being voted on, but that decision sparked controversy between the different parties present, who accused the socialists of being controlled by Yes We Can.
On the one hand, the Popular Party described the debate on the train as a “circus show”, criticizing the “weakness” of Pedro Martín in the face of the “threat of Podemos, the other partner of the Cabildo government, to abandon the pact if that motion came out ahead”.
María José Belda, counselor of Sí Podemos, pointed out before the plenary session that the “ultra-developmentalist macroproject” implies “destroying our fragile territory, with kilometers of expropriations, works and inconvenience for years, without previously betting on improving the bus service and other measures not invasive”. The party insists that there are other alternatives, such as the construction of Bus/Vao lanes and promoting public transport.
Criticisms piled up and Pedro Martín had to go out and explain his decision, arguing that the budget for the work was “a fortune”, which would mean an investment of at least 2,500 million euros. In addition, he warned that the project, which the party supported so many times, would not be promoted in this mandate, as agreed with Sí Podemos in the governance pact.
Faced with those statements and the blunt position of Pedro Martín, the builders criticized the rejection of the project and dusted off the insular lawsuit. The president of Fepeco, Óscar Izquierdo, warned in a statement that “it seems that there is some interest in sinking Tenerife, turning it into the seventh smallest island of the archipelago, with the implicit, treacherous and true support of the government group and allies in the Cabildo, which function as fifth column”.
This position was joined by the representatives of the Canarian Coalition group, who announced at the beginning of February that they would present a motion in the next plenary session to raise national and European funds to finance the southern train. The nationalist spokesman, Carlos Alonso, pointed out in a note that “it is necessary for the Government of Spain to include the southern train line in the General Interest Railway Network (RFIG) and for it to form part of the indicative strategy for the development, maintenance and renovation of the railway infrastructure”.
The Popular Party also announced a motion in the Cabildo de Tenerife to express support for the southern train project, as well as to initiate a dialogue process to establish a roadmap for guided transport on the Island.
Given the initiatives of the Canarian Coalition and the Popular Party to take the debate on the southern train to the plenary session, Martín had to clarify again that the work “is not a priority”, in addition, he defended the governability pact signed with Sí Podemos, to whom the investment is a “nonsense”. “Calculating that 18 million annual trips were sold at the same price as the tram -12.5 million were made in this medium last year-, the investment would take 30 years to recover,” the party members pointed out.
The matter did not stop there. The Citizen Parliamentary Group (GPCs) registered in the Congress of Deputies a Proposal Not of Law (PNL) for the promotion of a railway network in Gran Canaria and Tenerife, with the aim of forming a “real alternative to road transport” in both islands.
Meanwhile, the president of the Government of the Canary Islands, Ángel Víctor Torres (PSOE), pointed out that the train in the south of Tenerife is a “necessary infrastructure” to deal with the “saturation” of traffic on the island and with a territory “reduced”. However, in his statements he made it clear that he respects the “autonomy” of the Cabildo.
The Hotel and Non-Hotel Association of Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera and El Hierro, Ashotel, also supported the southern train initiative and warned that Tenerife “may lose another decade” if no action is taken on infrastructures that alleviate daily collapses of road transport. The Federation of Metal and New Technology Companies (Femete) of Tenerife also gave its “resounding” yes to having a train in the south of the island because, according to them, it is a “strategic” infrastructure for island development due to the “multiple “benefits and savings it would generate.
Environmental “wreck” and economic “nonsense”
In contrast, the mayor of Arona, José Julián Mena, criticized the project, arguing that “faced with the development of the train, the priority for the municipality and the South region should be the public hospital, which has to be completed to improve the conditions of neighbors’ lives. In his opinion, the real need in that part of the island is a full-service public hospital.
Ben Magec-Ecologistas en Acción considers that the train as a solution to the collapse of vehicles on the island’s roads is economic “nonsense” and environmental “destruction”. They indicated in a statement that not only will it occupy space with the projected 80-kilometer railway, but it will also “devour” territory to build the entire network of infrastructures necessary to connect the seven stops with the population centers along its route.
Nor does the Deputy Minister for the Fight against Climate Change and Ecological Transition, Miguel Ángel Pérez, see the project as a priority, but not because he considers it harmful to the environment, but rather because of the large economic investment it entails. “You need to stop a bit and develop other plans,” he said. “Neither cars nor trains are rights, what is a right is to move,” continued Pérez, who believes that the Canary Islands should bet “on alternative mobilities” such as buses.
Fortunately for some and unfortunately for others, the southern train is on the list of parked macro-projects in Tenerife… for now.
