Catalan Consumer Agency opens sanctioning process against Renfe for R2 South disruption

The Catalan Consumer Agency has opened sanctions proceedings against Renfe for the management of the breakdown of the R2 South commuter rail service.

This was announced by territory minister Juli Fernández during an interview with TV3, explaining that the action is being taken due to the situation that travelers found themselves in the days following the incident.

Last Friday, the Consumer Agency announced that it had detected a lack of information for affected commuters in relation to service changes, timetables, and alternative transport connections or closed customer service points, among others.

These are considered "very serious" infractions and could carry fines between €100,001 and €1 million.

Last week, the consumer protection group sent inspectors to Sants train station to ensure that Spain's national railway management company Renfe reported incidents correctly.

In a statement, the agency said that the "social disruption" caused because of the breakdown of the R2 South commuter rail service is very "serious."

Renfe laments "continuous offensive" 

Renfe responded to the disciplinary proceedings opened against them by the Catalan Consumer Agency by saying they regretted having found out via the media.

The company said they were unhappy with the "continuous offensive" against them, and that they had passed on all information about the management of services following the incident on the R2 south line to the Catalan territory ministry. 

Renfe said that citizens were their main concern and promised to offer improvements to travelers. 

R3 overhead wire fire

Fernández's  announcement comes a day after a fire on the overhead wire of the R3 commuter rail service between the northern towns of Manlleu and Ripoll.

During the night, staff worked to repair the incident, and on Wednesday morning, trains were operating again.

The incident saw a substantial fire on an overhead wire, which ended up falling on top of a train with commuters inside.

The Catalan president, Pere Aragonès, called for solutions, saying "the situation cannot continue like this."

"It cannot be possible that each day there is a new incident. There is a need to protect travelers," he said.

Commuter: "It's exhausting" 

Pilar Rodríguez, a regular user of the R3 in Manlleu, told the Catalan News Agency (ACN) that she asked if everything was fixed before getting on the train on Wednesday morning.

"It's scary that something could happen," she said, adding that she's constantly worried about delays on the R3 line. "It's exhausting, every day."

Spain's transport minister reprimanded 

Meanwhile, the Spanish transport minister, Raquel Sánchez, was reprimanded by the Senate in Madrid over the management of the Rodalies commuter service. Sánchez is ultimately responsible for the service operated by state-owned Renfe using infrastructure managed by another state-owned company, ADIF. 

Spain's upper house voted 121 votes in favor, 113 against and 19 abstentions to approve the motion from Catalan pro-independence party Esquerra Republicana. 

The text reprimanded Sánchez "for the constant inefficiency in the management of Renfe and ADIF in Catalonia and other autonomous communities, the inability to adopt measures to deal with incidents and the daily impact on the quality of the service and the mobility of travelers."