ACTING through national infrastructure manager Adif, Spain’s Ministry of Transport, Mobility and the Urban Agenda (Mitma) has awarded a joint venture of Comsa, FCC and Ferrovial a €540.4m contract to undertake civil works to place underground the section of the Barcelona - Portbou main line passing through the centre of Montcada i Reixac on the northern outskirts of Barcelona.

Work will include the construction of a 4km tunnel that will eliminate two level crossings over a busy section of the railway and enable widening of the line from two to three tracks. A new underground station will be built for Montcada i Reixac.

The contract was retendered with a budget of €621m following a successful legal challenge to the terms of the original tender. As well as the winning grouping of Comsa, FCC and Ferrovial, Mitma says that bids were received from three other joint ventures:

  • Dragados, Tecsa, ACSA, San José
  • OHLA, Sacyr, Acciona, Rubau, and
  • Vías y Construcciones, Copisa, Azvi, Ingeniería y Servicios.

During evaluation, the bid from Comsa, FCC and Ferrovial achieved the best technical and financial scores after the prices of two of the other bids were found to be “unreasonably low,” Mitma says.

Adif asked these two bidders to justify their prices. Their responses were analysed by both Adif and an independent consultant, Geocontrol, but were not accepted by Adif technical staff nor the committee responsible for awarding the contract.

Montcada i Reixac is served by line R2 of Renfe’s Barcelona suburban network, as well as regional route R11 to Portbou on the French border, and Mitma says that the project here is one of the most ambitious within its Barcelona suburban investment programme.

The new underground alignment is designed for a maximum speed of 140km/h and with maximum gradients of 3%. The new station will have two side platforms, with the third central track used by regional services not stopping at Montcada i Reixac.

Separately, Mitma has awarded via Adif a €30.2m contract to remodel Montcada Bifurcació station on lines R3, R4 and R7 of the Barcelona suburban network. Work including the construction of three 200m-long platforms and lengthening two passing loops to 800m will be undertaken by a joint venture of Dragados and Tecsa.

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