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TRAIN TRAVEL

Spain to launch €15 high-speed train between Madrid and Galicia

Spain’s public rail provider Renfe has put thousands of €15 tickets on sale for the highly-anticipated AVE route between the Spanish capital and the green northwestern region of Galicia.

Published: 23 November 2021 12:24 CET
Updated: 28 November 2021 08:00 CET
Spain to launch €15 high-speed train between Madrid and Galicia
The Ourense-Madrid leg of the trip will be the fastest at just 2 hours 15 minutes. Photo: Contando Estrelas/Flickr

It’s been sixteen years in the making but as of December 21st 2021, there will finally be a high-speed train which links Madrid to Galicia.

It will take approximately 2 hours and 15 minutes from the Spanish capital to Ourense rather than the current four hours, the fastest stretch of the route on which the new AVE train will be able to reach speeds of 300km/h. 

Train journeys between Madrid and other Galician cities such as Vigo, A Coruña, Pontevedra and Santiago will also be reduced by anywhere between 54 minutes and 1 hour and 28 minutes.

There will be ten daily trains in both directions rather than the current six. 

Tickets go on sale on Tuesday November 23rd and the first commercial train will set off on December 21st.

In order to promote the new line, Renfe has decided to offer 250,000 tickets for just €15 for travel between Madrid and Galicia from December 21st 2021 to September 12th 2022. 

The €9-billion project was meant to have been completed 13 years ago but has been marred by constant delays and missed five official deadlines. 

According to Spain’s Transport Minister Raquel Sánchez, this high-speed section is “without a doubt, the most complicated of the entire Spanish rail network as it includes 30 tunnels and 30 viaducts, necessary to overcome the complicated orography of the route”.

The government, as the minister explained, plans to reduce the trip by another 20 minutes with the arrival of the Talgo 106 series trains, known as Avril, which will allow speeds of 330 kilometres per hour.

But for now the biggest beneficiaries are those travelling between Madrid and Ourense, as the new journey times provided suggest: 

  • Ourense-Madrid: 2 hours 15 minutes
  • Vigo-Madrid: 4 hours 16 minutes
  • Pontevedra-Madrid: 4 hours
  • Santiago-Madrid: 3 hours 20 minutes
  • A Coruña-Madrid: 3 hours 51 minutes
  • Lugo-Madrid: 4 hours 46 minutes

Ave stands for Alta Velocidad Española (Spanish high speed), a service of high-speed rail in Spain operated by Renfe, the Spanish national railway company.

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TRAVEL NEWS

What will Europe’s EES passport checks mean for dual nationals?

The EU's Entry & Exit System (EES) of enhanced passport checks will usher in big changes for travellers - here we answer readers' questions on the position for dual nationals.

Published: 22 April 2024 17:10 CEST
What will Europe's EES passport checks mean for dual nationals?

The EU is preparing, after many delays, to introduce the EES system for travel in and out of Europe.

You can find a full explanation of how it works HERE, but in essence it is an enhanced passport check – registering biometric details such as fingerprints and facial scans and introducing an automatic calculation of how long you have stayed within the EU/Schengen zone in order to detect ‘over-stayers’.

And it’s already causing stress for travellers. We asked readers of The Local to share their questions here – and one of the biggest worries was how the system will work for dual nationals ie people who have a passport for both an EU country and a non-EU country.

EES: Your questions answered

EU passports 

One of the main purposes of EES is to detect ‘over-stayers’ – people who have either stayed in the EU longer than their visa allows or non-EU nationals who have over-stayed their allowance of 90 days in every 180.

As this does not apply to EU nationals, people travelling on an EU passport are not required to do EES pre-registration and will continue to travel in the same way once EES is introduced – going to the ‘EU passports queue’ at airports, ports and stations and having their passports scanned as normal.

Non-EU 

Non-EU travellers will, once EES is up and running, be required to complete EES pre-registration.

This means that the first time they cross an EU/Schengen zone external border they will have to go to a special zone of the airport/port/terminal and supply extra passport information including fingerprints and a facial scan.

This only needs to be done once and then lasts for three years.

Non-EU residents of the EU/Schengen zone

This does not apply to non-EU citizens who are permanent residents of an EU country or who have a long-stay visa for an EU/Schengen zone country – click HERE for full details.

Schengen zone passports/Irish passports 

EES applies within the Schengen zone, so people with Swiss, Norwegian and Icelandic passports are treated in the same way as citizens of EU countries.

Ireland and Cyprus are in the EU but not the Schengen zone – these countries will not be using the EES system at their borders, but their citizens are still EU citizens so can continue to use EU passport gates at airports and will be treated the same as all other EU citizens (ie they don’t have to do EES pre-registration).

OK, so what if you have both an EU and a non-EU passport?

They key thing to remember about EES is that it doesn’t actually change any of the rules on immigration – it’s just a way of better enforcing the rules that are already in place. 

Therefore the rules for dual nationals remain as they are – for most people which passport to travel on is a matter of personal choice, although Americans should be aware that if you have a US passport and you are entering the USA, you must use your American passport. 

But it’s also important to remember that the passports of dual nationals are not ‘linked’ – therefore if you present an American passport at the Italian border, you will be treated exactly the same as every other American, there is no way for the border guard to know that you are also Italian.

Likewise if you are a UK-Germany dual national and you travel back to the UK on your German passport, you can expect to be treated the same as every other German at the border, and might be asked for proof of where you are staying in UK, how long you intend to stay etc – the system has no way of knowing that you are also British. 

Therefore whether you have to complete EES pre-registration or not is entirely a matter of which passport you are travelling on – if you use your EU passport you won’t have to do it, if you use your non-EU passport you will.

It’s also possible to use two passports for the same trip – so let’s say you’re travelling from Spain to Canada – you enter Canada on your Canadian passport, and show your Canadian passport again when you leave. However, once you re-enter Spain you show your Spanish passport in order to benefit from the unlimited length of stay.

If you’re travelling between France and the UK via the Eurostar, Channel Tunnel or cross-Channel ferry, you need to remember that the Le Touquet agreement means that French passport checks take place in the UK and vice versa. You can still use both passports, but you just need to keep your wits about you and remember to hand the French one to the French border guards and the British one to British guards.

In terms of avoiding immigration formalities using two passports is the most efficient way for dual nationals to travel, but some people prefer to stick to one passport for simplicity, or don’t want to keep both passports together in case of theft.

Basically it’s a personal choice, but you just need to remember that you will be treated according to the passport that you show – which includes completing EES pre-registration if you’re showing a non-EU passport.

It’s also worth remembering that if the changes do cause border delays (and there are fears that they might especially at the UK-France border), then these will affect all travellers – regardless of their passport. 

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