At last! The renovated and historic Gran Vía metro station reopens after more than 1,000 days closed

Metro de Madrid has reopened its Gran Vía station and its connection with Sol this Friday after spending more than 1,000 days under construction due to the appearance of archaeological remains that have repeatedly postponed these works, started in 2018.

The works, which have involved the disbursement of 11 million euros, have been concluded and the station is ready to receive, once again, the more than 44,000 users who passed through it daily, if not more. And that the regional Executive foresees that they will increase by 22,000 more with the direct connection with the Sol station.

The Gran Vía modernization works have gone through four regional presidents, according to Europa Press: from the approval of the same by Cristina Cifuentes to her successors Ángel Garrido -who was later Minister of Transport- and Pedro Rollán, to the current regional leader , Isabel Diaz Ayuso.

Gran Vía is now the station with the most advanced technology in the network. Photo: EP

The historic find and the covid broke the times

The Madrid president closes one of the regional executive’s headaches for almost three years. It was on August 22, 2018 when the structure of the original elevator designed by the architect Antonio Palacios was located and the regional government began to combine the need to “guarantee the heritage of all” and advance in the works of this station.

As the Ministry of Transport recognized last year, the archaeological findings raised “important technical complications” both because it acts on “old infrastructures” and because of the “complex environment” with protection of cultural heritage.

In addition, this work was also affected in 2020 by the state of alarm of covid-19, which further slowed down these modernization works. With this reopening, the trains will again stop at Gran Vía and the network will recover the only station that connects lines 1 and 5.

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A stop with a lot of history (and with very long works behind it)

“What is new, what is original about this underground train, is that it has been built without noise or inconvenience, almost in complete secrecy, and that it will be delivered to the traveling crowd of Madrid as if in a gallant surprise.” Christmas 1918 was approaching and an emotional journalist from the ABC newspaper narrated the entrails of the first line of the Madrid underground, still without trains or passengers. “Now I am under the Plaza de Bilbao; further on I recognize my route and I know that I live a few meters below the Red de San Luis”. The Red de San Luis station, later called Gran Vía -and named after the coup plotter José Antonio (Primo de Rivera) for more than forty years. Metro line 1 was inaugurated in October 1919, in the middle of the pandemic of the misnamed Spanish flu, and the transport network has become so essential that, if it was built then “without noise or disturbance”, today Madrid residents and tourists regret not having been able to get on or off at the central station for a thousand days.

Line 1 of Metropolitan Alfonso XIII (original official name of this means of transport) was inaugurated on October 17, 1919 with the route between Cuatro Caminos and Puerta del Sol. The journey took just ten minutes, including the stops at the other six stations: Ríos Rosas, Martínez Campos (today the Church), Plaza de Chamberí, Glorieta de Bilbao, Hospicio (today the Tribunal) and Red de San Luis. The chronicles of the time tell us that there were eight stations covered with beveled white tiles – “in very bad taste and with the appearance of a funerary monument”, critics said -, 60 meters long and between 3 and 4 meters wide on their platforms. . The inaugural trip was made by the King himself together with the infantrymen, after the blessing of the Bishop of Madrid, and passed without incident. It would open to the public on the 31st of that month.

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The project had been requested in May 1914, but the concession was not granted until January 1917 due to lack of financing. The monarch himself had to put up one of the ten million pesetas with which the Alfonso XIII Metropolitan Company was set up, in charge of carrying out the project, which had four metro lines on plan.

The works began on July 10, 1917, so until its opening to the public 843 days passed. Not for a single station, but for the eight stations of Line 1 and the entire route between them. The access to the Red de San Luis station differed from the rest due to its pavilion, and which has been recreated in the new works, a polished granite porch that gave access to a staircase to go down to the lobby and that had an access elevator Free in its central part.

The new metro entrance in Gran Vía. Photo: EP

Among the problems encountered by the works at the time were “large sinkholes” as well as “diverting and rebuilding culverts.” In addition, the Sol station had a special difficulty when encountering groundwater, which was added to the fact that the main pipe of the Canal de Isabel II passed under it, which already supplied the capital with running water. Apart from the construction problems, getting the trains was the most difficult because only three Swiss factories were willing to build it in the middle of a war that was ravaging the continent. The contenders dedicated their resources to the war effort and the Swiss houses willing to create the vehicles demanded very high prices, so as many components as possible were finally built in Spain.

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At that time, the chronicler of the newspaper El Financiero was right, who pointed out: “The inauguration of this line means a lot for Madrid; it will mark a time for the population; it will change their customs, their living conditions, their way of being; but, for now, It has meant, with the mere fulfillment of that promise, something very important: it has been a lesson in energy and tenacity, in constant struggle against obstacles that are always serious and always renewed; it marks the abandonment of traditional modes of indifference and neglect, of endless procedures and useful work.”

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