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Escobar, Adrián. Zamorano, Clara Isabel. Jiménez, Pablo Lorenzo. Escobar, Jorge.
Due to this fact, the implementation of the slab track in Spain would require a significant
reduction of the height of the longitudinal profile of the infrastructure, in order to avoid having
such high embankments, generating a massive increase of the length of tunnels to be constructed
in all the High-speed network, with its consequent increase in the total construction costs of
these lines.
In addition, the reduction of height in the longitudinal profile would imply in the second instance
a greater concern with other factors, such as the drainage systems to be built, this being
another of the most important technical issues to be solved, since Spain has a large amount of
areas where total precipitation is concentrated in a few days throughout the year.
On the other hand, because the Spanish High-speed model does not reach operating speeds
above 300 km/h currently, it has not become indispensable to think about the possibility of
installing a slab track on the main sections of the network.
In conclusion, these important constraints together with the budgetary constraints justify the
use of the ballasted track instead of the slab track in the Spanish High-speed model, with 2,938
km of length.
3.4 Relationship between the rail superstructure and the speed
It can be observed in figure 2 a relation of the type of track used regarding to the maximum
design speed. For the realization of this figure, only the projects developed in the last 10 years
have been used.
Figure 2. Track typology depending on the maximum design speed
As shown in figure 2, there is a relationship between maximum speed and type of track to be
installed. Therefore, in the first instance it could be assumed that as long as the trend in the
construction of High-speed railway is to increase the maximum speed of the line, the type of
track that will predominantly be used will be that of slab track.
3.5 High-speed trends around the world
Therefore, it is observed that there is a clear tendency to justify the use of one type
of track against the other, for High-speed projects. In addition, in recent years the
224 360.revista de alta velocidad
