Understanding Land Transportation Networks and Infrastructure
Land Transportation
Transportation is the activity that moves people and goods between geographic locations. This is done using Earth modes, river, and air shipping.
The terrestrial network is centered in Madrid and extends to the borders and ports. This model began in the eighteenth century with the road network of the Bourbons and was consolidated in the nineteenth century as the railway network, basically coinciding with that of the road.
Road Transport
Roads connect different villages, so they are key to the accessibility of the territory. Its features are:
- The network competence is shared between the state, autonomous communities, and diputaciones. The statewide network links the main towns and communicates with the international network.
- The mainland road network has a radial design centered in Madrid with axes to the main ports and periphery.
- Interior traffic of passengers and goods is concentrated on the roads due to its lower price and because it allows door-to-door transport.
- The statewide network focused on most highways and expressways.
- The network density is higher in the most economically dynamic communities such as Madrid, Valencia, and Catalonia.
- The accessibility by road is higher and more homogeneous than other transport infrastructure.
- On the environmental impact, reduce car pollution by promoting public transport and rail.
- The strategic plan provides for transport infrastructure: to provide the entire territory of high accessibility by road and close the remaining axes as the Cantabrian motorway, the route of the silver-Huelva Asturias, the Mediterranean highway to Cadiz, and the link between the valleys of the Ebro and Duero.
Rail Transport
The railway was the main transport mode between the second half of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Since then, other means of transport have placed rail in a secondary position.
Rail Features:
Network sovereign powers are divided between the state and the autonomous communities. The state network is the majority and has lines that link the regions.
Since 2005, ADIF (Railway Infrastructure Management) manages the network.
RENFE provides passenger services and freight network in conventional and high speed. LVEF serving the passengers and goods on the narrow gauge network.
The railway network consists of 3 networks:
- The conventional network ready to run at speeds of less than 200 km/h, has a radial structure for the basic lines of the capital to the periphery.
- The high-speed network (AVE) equipped for driving at speeds above 200 km/h began with the Madrid Sevilla.
- The narrow gauge network is located mainly on the ledge.
The passenger traffic of goods is lower than the European average and is more profitable in the metropolitan commuter lines that connect the center to the urban periphery and is also more profitable high-speed lines that can compete with the airplane.
As for the technical characteristics are varied because some of the roads that have been modernized and is more secure but in many stretches of roads are still mediocre.
In terms of environmental impact, rail attempts to get their integration into the landscape, lowering the barrier of the roads and noise control.
The strategic plan for transport infrastructure gives attention to the railroad for almost 50% of investments the plan includes: providing access throughout the railway, improve safety, modernize the network, rail integration with the European Union and integration with European networks.