Zaragoza tram system serves the city of Zaragoza, the fifth largest city in Spain. The tram service connects the historic and modern areas of the city. Zaragoza is a province in the autonomous region of Aragon in Spain and is the 35th most populous municipality in European Union.
The city’s original tram system started in the late 1800s, reaching its peak in the 1950s before falling into decline and being converted to bus lines. The last Zaragoza tram line disappeared in 1976.
In 2009, construction began to equip the city with a new tram system – a complete transportation network that could accommodate both Zaragoza’s demographic growth and geographic expansion. The new system was 12.8 km and included over 25 stations – 15 new stops and 10 where single tracks run on parallel streets.
The customer, the TRAZA consortium, required fastenings that could provide flexibility for the project.
Thanks to its versatility, Pandrol QTrack® – a continuously supported embedded ballastless track system – was chosen for the tramway.
The system allowed the rail to be encapsulated by elastic resin bonded rubber profiles, providing a broad range of benefits such as vibration and electrical isolation among others. Pandrol QTrack® system is a cost effective and long-lasting performance solution offering an easy and straight forward installation process.
Pandrol QTrack®, when installed in concrete, provides support to all sides of the rail and allows stringent vertical and lateral support criteria to be met, and at the same time offers vibratory and electrical decoupling from its surroundings.
The features of the Pandrol QTrack® made the product a perfect fit for the specification required for the project.
“Pandrol QTrack® system is a cost effective and long-lasting performance solution offering an easy and straight forward installation process.”
Stage one of the project opened in April 2011. Since then extensions have been added. The first extension was from Gran Vía to Plaza de España in October 2012. In December of the same year, the line was extended by a further 844 m to César Augusto and Plaza del Pilar.
Zaragoza Tram has brought about a new urban concept which has revitalised the city centre by eliminating vehicular traffic and promoting pedestrianised areas.
Zaragoza’s tram line was awarded the prize of ‘Best Worldwide Urban Integration Project of the Year’ by the International Association of Public Transport (UITP) during the 2012 Global Light Rail Awards.
