The Minister of Housing, Transport and Infrastructure of the Community of Madrid, Jorge Rodrigo, has defended this Monday the modification of the expansion project of Line 11 of the Madrid Metro between Plaza Elíptica and Conde de Casal with which it seeks to "minimize" the affected trees.
"The modification has been carried out so that many trees are not affected and that the occupations of public roads are less," he stated during a visit to the Madrid Metro headquarters.
On Friday, the new Environmental Impact Statement of this extension was released, which has been released to public information so that allegations can be presented this month.
It maintains the Madrid Río station within the park and includes the results of the tree-by-tree analysis announced in February by the Community after weeks of neighborhood mobilizations against logging.
The municipal group of Más Madrid has warned that building the Madrid Metro line 11 station in the Madrid Río park is “clearly illegal” as it fails to comply with the urban planning of the capital and has asked the regional government that this infrastructure “ Get out of the park."
“The modification of Metro line 11 recognizes what both Más Madrid and the residents have been demanding for months: that an environmental impact statement is necessary. The project could be modified to improve it, but the PP has categorically refused”, said the socialist councilor Álvaro Fernández Heredia in an audio sent to the press. “The station must leave the park and they must not make us choose between cutting down one or the other trees”, he added.
In recent months, there has been an intense neighborhood mobilization against the project to expand Metro line 11, which would include the construction of two new stations (Madrid Río and Comillas) and would imply the felling of a thousand trees.
Initially, the construction of a single new station, Madrid Río, located on Paseo de las Yeserías, was planned, but during the public information process, a second station, Comillas, was incorporated into the project at the request of residents and the City Council. from Madrid.
During the drafting phase of the project, the Madrid Río station was moved a few meters due to different technical conditions, such as the modification of the tunnel layout to include the Comillas station, as well as to avoid proximity to other infrastructures such as the the M-30 on the Prague bridge, the adduction pipes of Canal de Isabel II and high voltage lines that run through the area.
