Page 166 - 360.revista de Alta Velocidad - Nº 6

Coronado, José María. Moyano, Amparo. Romero de Ávila, Vicente.
Rodríguez Lázaro, Francisco Javier. Ruiz Fernández, Rita.

1. Introduction

As any other transport mean, High Speed Rail (HSR) is used by tourists when it is the most
convenient mode in terms of travel time and costs, and when the timetables fit properly to
their needs. HSR mainly allows connections between city centers, being useful for urban cultural
tourism and business tourism (Coronado, et al., 2013). It also provides shorter travel times than
the car or the bus, making same-day tourism trips more attractive in longer distances (Moyano,
et al., 2016).
Once the tourist has arrived at the station, he/she must access the historic city center where
the monuments and tourism amenities are usually located. The natural itinerary is walking along
the “Station Street”, a street created in the 19th century in order to connect the railway station
to the consolidated city (Santos, 2007). These station streets took the form of tree planted,
wide and straight avenues that were flanked by important buildings such as banks, hotels, or
family palaces, etc. At the same time, these buildings were attracted by the relevance of the
railway at the time (Calvo, 1998) and today are part of the city’s visitor experience. In this way,
the urban visit starts already at the station gate, or even inside the station, in the cases where
the architecture is singular or interesting.
Back in the 19th century, when the city was not too relevant or there were other limitations
(i.e. topography, rivers, high land prices, etc.), stations were located at peripheral locations
within a variable distance to the city center. Usually, around the station, a neighborhood has
grown, more or less independent from the city’s historic core. In some cases where the distance
between the station and the city was not too long, the city growth has made the location
of these peripheral stations become similar to the initial edge locations. In these cases, the
connection between the city and the station is not so straight and wide, as it was achieved by
old conventional roads turned into regular streets by city growth. This is the case of the station
in Toledo, located at the other side of the Tagus River, which has been reused by the HSR (Figure
1). In this case, the pedestrian access to this peripheral HSR station is still possible, but some
tourists use taxis or specific buses that takes them right to the city center. Pedestrians have
different itineraries to access the city center: a shorter one, the historic pedestrian path, and
a longer one, used by cars and public transport.

Figure 1. Toledo in 19th century (left) and today (right). The station was located at the other side of the river Tagus.
Mapa Topográfico Nacional.

164 360.revista de alta velocidad