Myths and legends of the “most unfortunate” railway station in Europe
The story of Canfranca, a village at 1,190 meters above sea level on the Franco-Spanish border, is a story of excessive, ambitious ambition and shameful defeat, a story of incompetence and corruption, intrigue, smuggling and centuries of pitch, the Guardian reports.
Spain is iron to show that it is capable of building something the size of a magnificent European “cathedral between railway stations”, as he says Alfonso Marco, author of the books Canfranc, the story of the legendary train.
“By the time it was built, it already belonged, conceptually and technically, in the 19th century,” he told the Guardian. The plans were actually based in 1853, and the station was not built until 1928. Marco, the third generation of railroad workers in the family, was born at Canfranc station, where his father worked.
“Pyrenees are no longer available,” is then pompously marked by the then King of Spain at the opening ceremonies of the railway line across the Pyrenees Alfonso XIII. But the mountains were just one of many obstacles to Canfranc’s success. Around the web becomes a series of myths and legends, such as the one to change the course of World War II. That’s not true, but she definitely played a role in it.
A station for spies and smugglers
After the Nazis occupied France, the French regime in Spain used Canfranc to commodity change tungsten, crucial in the manufacture of tanks, for Nazi gold, including a single shipment weighing as much as 86 tons.
Franco wanted to maintain good relations with Britain and the United States, but was unwilling to set up a lucrative deal with Nazi Germany.
“As an international border crossing, Canfranc was more discreet and much less visible than others,” explains Marco. Mail was used on all sides, but numbers of Jews were not said to have fled before the persecution in France.
“There’s a grain of truth in all of these stories, but they’ve all grown into entirely exaggerated dimensions,” says Marko. “For example, it is true that the Jews used it to cross the border, but not to the extent that it is said. And although during the war the Germans did manage the customs on the French side, Canfranca was never occupied. they are fake at the station. “
A metaphor for condensed ambitions
Marc also dislikes the use of the nickname “Mountain Titanic,” which can agree that Canfranc, as a cruise accident, can be seen as a metaphor for failed ambitions, and admits the station had plenty of pitch. In fact, she had little else but resin.
The post office barely opened well when it was hit by the financial crisis of 1929. Two years later, it was almost completely divided by fire. In 1936, the Spanish Civil War then began, and the moment it ended, World War II broke out. By the time the bloodshed finally ended, Franco’s dictatorial regime was isolated, and international rail traffic only came to life again in the 1950s.
But the tracks on the French side were different from those on the Spanish, so they had to unload passengers and luggage at the border and transfer to another train, thus prolonging the already long journey time. The railway line across the Pyrenees was thus never really profitable.
In 1970, a bridge was damaged in a train derailment, which was an excuse to abandon the megalomaniacal post office with 365 windows and a 200-meter-long platform, which was thus left to the ravages of time and inadvertently became a “railway mausoleum of immense sentimental and historical value. “, as Marco says. “A part of history that is no longer ignored and that deserves to be known and appreciated.”
Will the hotel revive you and the station?
Today, the station is used for domestic traffic, and even to a very limited extent. But now a 104-room hotel designed by an architect is supposed to give her new life Joaquín Magrazó v Used Fernando in collaboration with the Aragonese regional government and the Barceló hotel chain.
The budget is € 27 million, of which the Arange government will contribute € 12 million for track repairs and landscaping. The façade will be preserved, but a new one will be built for the authentic station, which passengers will be able to enter through the hotel lobby.
The complex will include a 200-seat conference center, a railway museum, shops and a shelter for pilgrims, as Canfranc is on one of the pilgrimage routes to Santiago de Compostela. Authorities and designers hope the hotel, which would be built in late 2022, will revive the village, although Marco believes it will take some time before the connection with France is re-established.
In 2020, France and Spain agreed to start work to reopen the 7.8-kilometer-long Somport tunnel connecting the country, and with EU support, they hope to have the Canfranc line fully operational by 2026 .
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