The mayor of Toledo, Carlos Velázquez, stated in an interview on Radio Castilla-La Mancha this Sunday that the proposal for the Madrid-Lisbon route passing through the city, presented by the City Council to the Ministry, «is very positive, as well as viable, legal, economic, and technically feasible,» and, being an improvement alternative, «would not require a new informative study, so we could be on track for 2030.»
This proposal was presented last Wednesday at the latest technical meeting held at the Ministry of Public Works and was «very well received by the technicians who assured us that they would study it,» a proposal that is «the result of a very intense participation process that probably has never been carried out before for a project of this kind.»
The mayor recalled that the Regional Government has also supported this proposal, with theirs being very similar to that of the City Council and has been endorsed by professional associations, such as engineers, industrialists, and civil engineers, as well as other entities, all of whom have agreed on four fundamental premises, «almost unanimous.»
These four requirements stem from over 30 meetings with different groups with whom the mayor has met over the last few months to try to agree on «the best proposals.»
The first premise is that there should be a stop in Toledo «and we should be protagonists of the AVE between Madrid and Lisbon»; another is that the UNESCO World Heritage status should not be jeopardized, «something that has been hard-won, in fact, next year will mark 40 years since this designation was achieved and obviously it brings us many benefits.»
Carlos Velázquez also highlighted the premise that the Santa Bárbara neighborhood station should be guaranteed and protected «not only for a few years, but for the future,» and finally, that it should be a proposal «that adds value and is beneficial for current users and potential future users.»
Therefore, the ‘Toledo AVE’ proposal includes these four premises and proposes a single infrastructure, with a station in Santa Bárbara and a passing platform, «which would be an accessory to the Santa Bárbara station, ensuring virtually zero impact on heritage, guaranteeing the station’s durability, and also proposing a bypass to the south to correct the historical mistake of not having a connection to southern Spain, and even in the future, why not, directly with another bypass to the Levante.»
ASSEMBLY OF THE GROUP OF WORLD HERITAGE CITIES
The mayor also presented this proposal at the Assembly of World Heritage Cities held this weekend in Santiago de Compostela, affecting all of them, «because it is our duty to avoid jeopardizing the exceptional universal values that we must protect.»
It was an Assembly where «we worked intensively» and various topics were discussed, such as the new regulations for tourist rental properties with the aim of «making peaceful and harmonious coexistence between visitors and tourists we want to continue receiving and the lives of the residents, because we want lively historical centers.»
In this regard, he noted that concrete measures have been put in place by the City Council to support residents of the Historic District but also, «we have arranged a visit to the UNESCO headquarters and also a visit to the Ministry of Tourism in order to see if we can obtain significant funding to continue promoting and enhancing our cultural heritage, which is essential for Toledo to remain a heritage city,» he concluded.