see, I was right

castigate Spain but not UK,
castigate Spain but not Saudi Arabia

seems to be nothing but a "knock Spain" egotrip by AVE for a reporter from the Daily Wail.

I hardly castigated Spain, unlike your rant over your perception of the UK network. Yes the Uk rail could be improved (and is) but overall and for scale I believe it's good and I say that as a regular user.
By the way why did you introduce the Uk network into this thread?

I merely suggested that Spain would be better served by expanding its regional rail network and I stand by that. I would also suggest the majority of Spaniards would prefer that option.
If Spain could afford both,that would be great, however that does not appear to be the case.

PS A bit of civility in your replies would be appreciated.

I'm going to sound uncivil here. But I don't mean to. I just do need to point out that;
If everyone always did 'what most people prefer' Then there would be no grand schemes to look back on and be proud of. And Spain would all be riding donkeys. And you wouldn't have got yourself here in that big shiny aeroplane! Sometimes people have to ignore the constant chittering and whingeing and push ahead with real grand plans and innovation.
Sometimes there are big mistakes but more often than not there are great successes because of a pioneering spirit. I'm willing to bet that the Ave will continue to be the envy of the world.

That's not being uncivil, that's voicing your opinion in a polite manner.

Grand schemes are fine if you can afford them, however when you do not have a bottomless pit of money you need to spend for the benefit of the majority, not the few who would use the AVE.
Where we have a house the train extension from Gandia to Denia and the Denia to Alicante upgrade have been axed for the foeseeable future. In my opinion these types of schemes give far better benefit and value to the general Spanish public than the AVE.
In the longer term the AVE would be great but not at the moment.
That's more Daily Mirror than Daily Mail.

Not even the Spanish themselves are that impressed, especially those that will never be able to afford to use it.
I've said before, technically it's great, (thanks to the French and German technology) financially it's a huge money pit, never ever likely to make a profit in our time. Some lines are already closed, most are hopelessly under used, and yet Spain still continues to surge blindly ahead building more even less profitable lines. Portugal has pulled out of the Lisbon line, they can't afford it, but Spain of course is so much better off financially. And whilst this vanity product continues wasting huge sums of money, savage cuts are being made in health provision. I'm sure the average man in the street, the one that can't afford the AVE, would much rather see the money spent on health.
This guy was a consultant/advisor for Renfe, he knows his stuff, read his thoughts on the AVE, the cost, not just of building it, (¡once millones de euros por kilómetro!) but maintaining it are eye watering.
http://www.fedeablogs.net/economia/?p=7824#more-7824

I think that the different shape and population distribution between UK/Spain make all the difference between the usability and desirability of an extensive HST network. If you look at UK it is long and thin and the centers of large population are very frequent in the south less so in the north. I seem to remember that 500 miles is the max distance at which the train competes well with short haul air routes so in reality the London Glasgow/Edinburgh is the only desirable route. The London/Birmingham stretch is just the first step in the overall plan north to Edinburgh. Birmingham is the single largest population council in UK but it would not be worth the effort of connecting that population to the capital buried deep in the south east corner of UK just to save the odd few minutes on the existing journey time. Many billions have just been spent on up-grading the West Coast mainline for speed and capacity and yet it is already running full. So to do more would need a new track route. You could of course use one of the old tracks such as the Midlands mainline route but that could not be easily up-graded to AVE standards. So the decision on the grand plan is a new route which will take many years to reach its final destination.

Spain on the other hand is roughly square and its capital is almost at the center and the distance to the corners just about perfect for AVE. The routes Madrid-Sevilla, Madrid-Barcelona, Madrid-Irun and Madrid-A Coruna are just about ideal in distance for the time savings to be worthwhile. Although there are many Regional capitals to be picked up on route and you can run a few trains each day straight through with the other stopping to pick up additional passengers.

so the Spanish have made a decision about where they will spend their money and it means a couple of Brit Expats will not have a door to door train service that they seem to think is their right. So lets slag off the Spaniards and how they decide to spend their money.
But I do notice you said "upgrade" so that means you have a train service. Just not as plush, fast and impressive as you think you were promised.
Meanwhile many poor Spaniards are lucky to get a bus service twice a week.

looking at it from the large end of the telescope it really seems quite reasonable, but forgive me if I don't worry about a couple of BE's
Oh how the other half live

`

Here's some rail development news, that will be of interest to car drivers (the electric kind) too.

http://www.spaintechnology.com/icex/...638609,00.html

This is great. And a brilliant way of explaining how'grand projects' (such as space travel as another example), whilst they seem outrageously expensive for perceived small benefit, bring forward innovations which may well alter all our children's futures much for the better.

That's the very reason why the money should be invested in regional/local services and not the AVE.

The local train and bus services in Spain are generally already excellent

As long as you live close to a good sized town/city of course

You cant expect regular public transport elsewhere, if you dont want to drive then you should factor that in when you choose where to live. It is the same anywhere in the world

Actually it's not.

There are some countries who go the extra mile by providing services to fairly remote areas.

It may have escaped your notice and come as a shock to you townies, but not everyone is able or wants to live in or near big areas of population and either prefer outlying rural areas or have their work or business because of its very nature located in quiet areas.

To be fair, I think the bus services available in Spain to most villages compare favourably with those in France, Italy or Portugal - and even to rural areas of the UK where the geographical distances are much smaller. Even on Sundays and public holidays there is a bus service, I was amazed when I first came here to see buses running on Christmas Day (and I still am!).

When calculating whether a train service is profitable and/or should be subsidised there are also business and education considerations to be factored in. I think both benefit in Spain from the high speed rail links.