"We expect that the Government in office can rectify this injustice with the region over a project that is crucial for territorial cohesion, European integration and social and economic development with a view to carbon neutrality", said today, quoted in a press release, the president of the Board of the Vale d'Ouro Association, Luís Almeida.

The request for clarification to the Government of the Democratic Alliance (AD), led by Luís Montenegro, was made following a response from the European Union to questions raised by Vale d'Ouro after it became known, in December, that the Transmontana high-speed line was not included in the trans-European transport network (TEN-T).

Headquartered in Pinhão, in the municipality of Alijó, district of Vila Real, the association has defended the Douro railway line, its reactivation to Spain and also the new corridor for the high-speed line of Trás-os-Montes, connecting Porto to Spain.

Vale d'Ouro participated in the public consultation for the National Railway Plan, submitting a study for a new high-speed line between Porto--Vila Real--Bragança--Zamora, a proposal that provides for the connection to the Madrid-Galiza high-speed line 35 kilometres from the border.

The organisation specified that, on 19 December, the preliminary document was released identifying the TEN-T network corridors and where the Porto-Madrid Line via Trás-os-Montes was not included, and stressed that, at the time, it expressed its concern about this decision, having contacted the European authorities for clarification.

The Vale d'Ouro Association said that the office of the President of the European Parliament has now informed that the high-speed line of Trás-os-Montes constitutes "a project of common interest for Portugal and Spain", and must be approved by these member states for inclusion in the TEN-T.

That is, according to the response sent to the Douro organisation, under Articles 171 and 172 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, this high-speed line would constitute "a project of common interest related to the territory of Spain and Portugal and, as such, would require the approval of both member states in order to be legally included in the EU TEN-T Regulation".

The European Parliament also confirmed that the project "was not included in the final version of the National Railway Plan adopted by the Portuguese Government in 2022, on the basis of which it could have been added to the Council's mandate for the negotiations".

For Luís Almeida, this situation "is very serious".

"We had confirmation that the line was going to be considered and now we know, via the European Parliament, that it is not even included in the version of the National Railway Plan submitted to Europe. Once again, the commitment to the region failed, this is another blow to the confidence of Trás-os-Montes in the authorities of Lisbon", he stressed.

In the letter sent this week to the Government, Vale d'Ouro also requested "objective commitments to the modernisation of the Douro Line".

The association asked the railway authority in Portugal "to define execution schedules in which the infrastructure manager fulfils the commitments made to the Douro region and for which it is held accountable, at a time when decades of inoperability and inexcusable delays have accumulated and in which the execution of Ferrovia 2020 does nothing to honour national competence".

Finally, it guaranteed that it will continue to follow both dossiers - the Porto-Madrid high-speed line and the Douro Line - in the "expectation that the new Government can give the necessary impetus and that both become reality in the short term".

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