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New train linking Murcia and Elche with Madrid arrives this September
Ouigo becomes the latest rail operator to connect the Costa Blanca and Costa Calida with the Spanish capital
After numerous delays and disappointments, French rail company Ouigo has confirmed that it will begin operating low-cost trains from Madrid on September 5. The train will travel south through Alicante province and on to Murcia, which is the end of the line.
Rail connections between the Spanish capital and southern Spain are still very limited so passengers were excited when Ouigo’s general director announced back in January that their trains would hit the tracks “before the summer”.
Barely two months later, the company said it would only be able to offer one train in each direction from Fridays to Sundays in summer, because of the work being done on the Atocha through tunnel, which will eventually connect with Chamartín in Madrid.
However, neither of these two promises came to fruition, and it now seems that travellers will have to wait until the end of the high season for the new link.
The September start date has been set in stone though and tickets are already on sale for the two daily round-trips. What has come as a disappointment is that the trains won’t stop at the Miguel Hernández de Orihuela train station on the Murcia-Madrid line, so the 380,000 or so potential customers in the Veja Baja region (far more in summer) will have to travel to either the Murcia station of El Carmen or the Matola stop in Elche.
In any case, the two trains will depart from Madrid at 8.15am and 4.15pm and from Elche at 1.02pm and 9.02pm with an estimated travel time of two hours and 20 minutes.
The only stop planned will be in Albacete, which the company estimates will be only two minutes. On the day of release, the prices started at 9 euros each way for the basic seats but these are almost sold out so the prices will definitely go up.
As well as offering travellers more choice, the addition of Ougo is good for the pocket as Renfe, Spain’s main rail operator, has been forced to counterattack with special offers of its own. Renfe currently runs up to 16 daily trains between Murcia and Madrid, and most of these do stop in Orihuela.
In response, Renfe has put certain tickets on sale for the same price as Ouigo, but travellers should remember that, since there are more stops, the journey generally takes around 40 minutes longer.
Also of interest: 25 million invested in expanding Alicante train station and tracks
Image: Ouigo
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