The City Council of Flaçà, in the Gironès, Adif and the Generalitat have allocated the 4.8 million euros that the works will cost to eliminate the level crossing that splits the town in half.
This is a work that has been demanded for years and will be a reality in the next four years.
The three institutions signed an agreement in 2019 that expired on November 21. A day before, the Spanish government gave approval to renew it for another four years and the parties were asked to allocate the money that each of them must contribute. Adif will be the one who will allocate the most money with 2.4 million euros, the Generalitat will provide 1.4 while the City Council is responsible for 968,000 euros, corresponding to land expropriations.
If nothing goes wrong, in the coming years the Flaçà railway level crossing will be history. On November 20, the Council of Ministers signed the agreement to extend the agreement between Adif, the City Council and the Generalitat for another four years, to carry out a "necessary and decisive" work for the residents of the town of Girona.
An extension that almost didn't go ahead and, consequently, the entire project that has already been drafted. And in October 2019, Adif, Generalitat and the council signed the first agreement to eliminate the level crossing. During this time the project was drafted, but an extension was necessary, which was signed one day before this agreement expired. "It was at the last minute and we would have been very sorry to miss this opportunity," says the mayor of Flaçà, Joan Adroher.
The mayor of Flaçà, Joan Adroher, explains that the problem was one of safety, since there had been cases of people crossing the tracks when the barrier was lowered. The reason, Adroher points out, was that sometimes you have to wait up to 20 minutes to pass. This occurs when two trains cross a few minutes apart and Renfe keeps the barriers down to avoid accidents.
Apart from the cars and pedestrians affected, users of the bus line that connects Palafrugell with Girona and that passes through Flaçà also suffer. The City Council has even placed canopies on both sides of the roads for those residents waiting to cross.
However, Adroher acknowledges that they are very satisfied to "finally be so close." The mayor recalls that this is a "historical problem" and proof of this is the more than 50 projects that have ended up being rejected to eliminate the level crossing.
The proposal that has gone ahead has been the one presented by the Flaçà City Council, after rejecting some that "cut into the territory." Thus, what has finally been approved is a proposal that contemplates the diversion of the road so that, instead of crossing the train tracks, it runs parallel.
This would force the expropriation of three pieces of land and the demolition of a house. This cost is the one that the City Council will assume and that would serve to lengthen the road that would run alongside the train track to a point where the elevation of the land and the tracks is sufficient to allow the road to pass underneath and reconnect again with the road that crosses the town.
In addition, the project that will finally be carried out proposes an underground pedestrian crossing next to the station area for those residents who must cross the tracks. In addition, the work would allow in the future to connect with the C-66 and, through an underground passage, with the industrial estate that is planned to go forward.
