Viana do Castelo, Portugal, Sept. 3, 2024 (Lusa) - The mayor of Viana do Castelo said on Tuesday that he was ‘taken by surprise’ by the proposal of the Alto Minho Intermunicipal Community (CIM) to complete the National Rail Plan with a line between Arcos de Valdevez and Ponte de Lima.
‘The promised and long-awaited High-Speed Rail line between Vigo and Porto, which will connect the entire Atlantic coastline of Galicia and Portugal, continues to increase its area of influence and growth possibilities. In addition to the 150-kilometre route that will have stations in Valença, Braga and Porto airport, the north of Portugal is already planning a railway that would complement it in the cities that would be left without the high-speed train line," reports the Galician newspaper Faro de Vigo.
‘This is news to me. I don't know what it is. I was surprised by this news,’ said Luís Nobre at the municipal council meeting.
The Socialist mayor was responding to independent councillor Eduardo Teixeira, who reported that a Galician newspaper had said that ‘the Alto Minho CIM has presented its contribution to the National Rail Plan to the central government, which includes small actions to structure its region better and maximise the benefits of the train in it’.
‘I have little faith in the solution, but I'll show solidarity with my colleagues. Sometimes they don't help to attract and retain people, on the contrary, they help to empty territories. I'm not shocked that people are pointing the way. Some even advocate extending the metro to Viana do Castelo, but then we need to understand how effective these infrastructures will be,’ said Luís Nobre.
According to the mayor, the ‘defence’ of Alto Minho should be the Minho Line, which ‘serves the whole region in a broader and more transversal way’. At the same time, the CIM proposal reported today in the Spanish press ‘will serve around four or five companies or around 20,000 inhabitants’.
Contacted by the Lusa agency, the president of the Alto Minho CIM, Manoel Batista, said he was unaware of the proposed route and assured that the entity that brings together the 10 municipalities of the Viana do Castelo district ‘made its contribution to the National Rail Plan in 2023, in agreement with all the mayors’.
‘In the document we sent to the National Rail Plan, we talked about strengthening the railway on the Minho line, with a connection to the seaport of Viana do Castelo, the high-speed line with an intermediate station in Porto de Lima and the possibility of a high-speed connection to Viana do Castelo, or at the limit in Valença,’ he explained.
According to the newspaper, the CIM's proposal ‘proposes the construction of a new conventional railway line parallel to the current A27, serving as a complementary transversal axis to the one promised for 2032’.
ABC/ADB // ADB.
Lusa
