Renfe adds more capacity and renews its Avant fleet, its high-speed medium-haul | Companies

What could be one of Renfe’s most popular high-performance services, Avant (High Speed ​​Medium Distance), will occupy a priority position in the overall operator’s development. You wonder about the high demand and purpose of removing vehicles from the road. Medium-haul traffic jumped from 8.8 million passengers in 2019 (a figure that practically recovered in 2022) to 13.2 million in 2024. In addition to being a subsidized service, as an Obligation of Public Service (OSP), travel on Avant is subsidized at a 50% discount from September 2022 until the end of the year, enhancing the travel option that is now being experienced. To be enhanced with improvements. It is about returning attention to this regional traffic with the development of long-distance routes.

This train, which connects large population centers across the country at speeds of up to 300 kilometers per hour, is working on an action plan to increase capacity, especially during times of peak demand. In addition to operating in a double combination (of double trains), a more modern fleet is allocated, which should have a higher quality effect. The result expected by Renfe’s management is greater flexibility of its offer, improved travel comfort and rationalization of occupancy levels, as well as better adherence to departure and arrival times.

The company has begun booking trains and drivers specifically for the Avant; Adjusts shifts of assigned employees to ensure service; It manages travel access control to reduce time, as well as coordination between Renfe and the ADEV route manager to speed up incident response. The railway company says everything helps raise punctuality rates. For Renfe’s president, Álvaro Fernández Heredia, this effort seeks to “convert the train to a situation much more attractive than a private car, also for distances up to 150 kilometres. When you speak for yourself, is the Avant high-speed or not, I would say it is much higher than the 120 kilometers per hour that a car travels on the highway.”

The lack of concrete in the Ministry of Transport extends to 2026 the bonus period of 50% on the Avant invoice price, the operator works with other platforms. “Price has been a very important factor in the increase in demand experienced by Avant, but there are other factors such as reducing travel time or increasing the number of plazas and, in some cases, frequencies,” explains Fernández Heredia.

Renfe is working on supply by putting double combination trains into circulation and introducing larger capacity vehicles to replace other vehicles. In this way, it began laying an additional 1,190 yards per week on the Barcelona-Lleida line at the end of last year. It is currently operating in Madrid-Puertolano, where it gained 7,140 weekly yards last summer, and now only 548 more pass through the movement between trains from the 104 series (237 yards) to the 100 series (337 yards), or opt for the double installation of 104 trains (474 ​​yards).

On the Madrid-Segovia-Valladolid line, the high-capacity Series 106 train launched in November. This is Talgo Avril, which previously provided the high-speed Avlo service between Madrid and Barcelona, ​​and now has to go through workshops to replace it. Gigs. With 581 yards out of 106, and the decision to increase the use of double-set trains, this resulted in an additional 5,810 yards being created per week. For example, the Valladolid-Madrid Avant now launches at 7.55am, 238 more yards per session than previously, the equivalent of 14.10pm, or flights between Madrid and Valladolid at 10.15 and 16.15. In the first week of operation of Line 106, Renfe received 2,000 additional passengers on this line compared to the average value of those passengers in the previous months.

Based on these experiences, the affiliated transport company has just created two new one-way routes, from Next to Next, between Cáceres and Badios. In this case, highways (112 km) and the bus, which was launched this year, are used to connect the maximum capitals in 46 minutes (75 minutes by car). At the same time, improvements are being implemented in the Avant area in the Figueres-Barcelona-Lleida corridors, in Madrid-Toledo, and in the corridors crossing Andalusia that surround the cities of Seville, Cordoba, Malaga and Granada.

Only the most important Avant lines last year supported traffic of more than 12 million passengers in an area of ​​influence with a population of 20 million. The challenge is to move forward with a client who in recent years has become redundant for reasons of work or study. With the 100% bonus, the price of a 100 km journey on Avant is €3, which is cheaper than traveling by bus.