Rail restoration demand

ASSOCIATIONS including the Almeria Platform for Public and Social Railway have demanded the restoration of the Guadix-Baza-Almanzora-Lorca railway, 34 years after the line was closed.
In a protest staged in Baza last week, around 100 people called on Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, Public Works Minister Jose Luis Abalos and the ADIF rail infrastructure administrator to restore the line for the “future of the south-east of the peninsular.”
The Baza Region Friends of the Railway organised the demonstration, the association’s president, Antonio Martinez, describing the decision to close down the line as “one of the biggest mistakes and injustices in infrastructure of the whole State.”
The Granada High Plateau Business Association and the AGAPRO Association of Farmers, Stockbreeders and Producers also lent their support to the “call for help” to the national and Andalucia governments in tackling “depopulation, the loss of economic activities and the absence of essential development infrastructure.”
The manifesto read out at the end of the demonstration asks the Government and ADIF to carry out a study on the viability of reopening the line.