Page 246 - 360.revista de Alta Velocidad - Nº 6

Miralles i Garcia, José Luis

4.2 Population growth of all cities and metropolitan areas with HSR services
versus all cities and metropolitan areas without HSR services

Table 4 shows the evolution of Population Growth Index of all cities and metropolitan areas with
HSR services, all Spain and all cities without HSR services. Remember that metropolitan areas
have been assimilated to the provinces where they are located. The list of metropolitan areas
considered as provinces is: Alacant, Barcelona, Córdoba, Madrid, Málaga, Sevilla, Tarragona,
València, Valladolid and Zaragoza. Obviously these provinces accumulate a large part of the
population of Spain.

Table 4. Population Growth Index of cities and metropolitan areas with/without HSR and Spain.

This table is contradictory with the previous one. In this case cities and metropolitan areas
with HSR services show a growth greater that Spain and cities without HSR services. However
the differences aren’t significant except in last period. The growth of cities and MA without HSR
services is the same as that of Spain until about 2010. After 2010 these cities and MA have had
a smaller growth than the one of Spain.

On the other hand, cities and MA with HSR services, from about 2006, have had a growth
greater than the one of Spain. However, from about 2011, the differences of growth between
cities and MA with or without HSR services increase significantly. The data seem to show that,
during the period of the economic crisis, cities and MAs with HSR respond better and increase
their relative growth relative to those without HSR.
The question is: Has the greatest growth been caused by the HSR services? Or rather, has the HSR
served to reinforce a global trend of expansion of metropolitan areas produced by other causes?
Probably the correct answer is the second because of different studies about metropolitan
areas show that metropolitan areas are expanding all over the world, also in Spain (Vheeler,
2008; Feria, 2016).

4.3 Population growth of each city with HSR services

Now the paper start the analysis of population growth of different cities with HSR services from
start its. The first HSR services started in 1992 in the cities of Sevilla, Córdoba, Puertollano,
Ciudad Real and Madrid. Table 5 show the Growth Index of these cities and general Growth
Index for all cities with/without HSR services and Spain.

244 360.revista de alta velocidad