Adif has awarded the joint venture (55/45) formed by Thales España and Siemens Rail Automation a contract for the installation of traffic control, automatic train protection, telecommunications and safety technologies on the Olmedo-Ourense high-speed line section, as well as for maintenance over a 20-year period. The amount of the contract is 512 million euros.

Thales is to install the ERTMS level 2 automatic train protection system, wayside LED light signals, axle counters for safe train detection, wheel sensors and landline telecommunications systems. Thales will also be responsible for installing new state-of-the-art electronic interlockings at several stations on the Medina del Campo-Zamora-Ourense conventional line affected by the work on the high-speed line.

The company will also provide all GSM-R mobile communications systems, power supply for the facilities, auxiliary detection systems, equipment buildings and auxiliary building work.

Siemens, for its part, is to install its safety solution based on electronic interlockings and associated technologies, with the ASFA system, centralised traffic control, supply of balises, track circuits, video surveillance systems and access control.

This 331 km section will benefit from ERTMS level 2 standard allowing a maximum speed of 350 km/h and reducing the journey to 2 hours. In 2018, it will provide a high-speed railway link between Ourense in Galicia and Olmedo near Valladolid.

The Madrid-Valladolid section came into service in December 2007, forming the first leg of the Madrid-Galicia high-speed line, and in December 2011 passenger operations began on the Ourense-Santiago de Compostela-A Coruña section. The Olmedo-Ourense section will complete this Spain’s main high-speed corridors – the North-Northwest line – and will link the regions of Galicia, Asturias, Cantabria, Castilla León and Madrid.

Thales and Siemens have extensive experience in Spain and other countries, with railway safety systems on high-speed and conventional lines. The two firms have jointly carried out projects on various Spanish high-speed lines.