Life is a draft that is crossed out and rewritten. For decades, the high-capacity train between Las Palmas and Maspalomas was a fantasy, a scribble in politicians' offices. Today, that fantasy has begun to take shape as a reality, or at least a formal commitment. The Spanish government, in a move that smacks more of necessity than conviction, has recognized a project valued at €2.000 billion as a work of public interest.
The signing of a collaboration agreement between the State, the Government of the Canary Islands, and the Gran Canaria Island Council is the first step in a dance that has yet to begin. The Canary Islands President, Fernando Clavijo, the Minister of Territorial Policy, Ángel Víctor Torres, and the Secretary of State for Transport, José Antonio Santano, were present at the event. The photo of the event, which sought to portray unity, is an image of bureaucracy that doesn't excite, but at least demonstrates that the project has emerged from the box of broken dreams.
The train, which will connect the capital with the tourist south, is not a whim. It's a need that has become urgent. The GC-1 highway, the island's backbone, is congested with a frequency that no longer surprises anyone. The projects have been approved, and the environmental impact statement is about to be completed. The Gran Canaria Island Council, led by its president, Antonio Morales, has worked for almost 20 years to ensure this project doesn't die of starvation.
The train, they have said, is the only "sustainable mobility alternative" for the island. The railway, argued Secretary of State José Antonio Santano, "brings territories closer together and people closer together." All this is true, but it is also true that the State is late to a meeting it has had pending with the islands for two decades. The final step, the one that truly matters, will be the signing of the multi-year agreement that sets the amounts the State will contribute, an investment in which the complicity of the European Union will also be sought.
President Clavijo said it with a phrase that is both an epitaph and a hope: "A first step doesn't take you where you want to go, but it does take you out of where you are." And today, the Gran Canaria train has emerged from the grave of forgotten projects. Now, time will tell if the machinery is set in motion, or if the signing of this protocol remains, once again, in the graveyard of good intentions.
