Starting on 1 February, the new Ave high speed train service will offer a direct connection between Madrid and Orihuela in 2 hours and 22 minutes with 4 daily services, 2 in each direction, early morning and late evening, offering 1,264 seats.
The service will connect Madrid Puerta de Atocha and the Elche High Speed and Orihuela Miguel Hernández stations, and will gradually expand as demand and health conditions allow.
In economy class the price of a one way ticket is 71.10 euros although there will be a series of promotional tickets for sale at significant price discounts of between 30 and 70 percent, which are currently being marketed in the different sales outlets.
The Oriolano mayor has said that the arrival of the AVE “will mean a better service to people across the entire region and of course it will also bring thousands of additional visitors into the area, promoting tourism at the regional level ”.
Travelers on AVE trains traveling on the Madrid-Elche-Orihuela line will have two classes, Turista and Turista Plus. There will also be Customer Service Centres where that will provide passenger information.
Renfe will use the S-102 model for the Madrid-Orihuela AVE service, the train that is the most technologically advanced. It has 12 carriages, fully accessible to people with disabilities, runs at a maximum speed of 300 kilometres per hour and has 316 seats divided into the two classes. The seats are very comfortable, folding and with footrests, and in addition each seat has individual light and folding table.
Renfe is fully committed to ensuring punctuality of its trains, with refunds of 50% of the ticket price for delays of between 15 and 30 minutes and 100% for delays of more than 30 minutes.
All well and good but a touch of irony that this is introduced with the Valencian Community in lockdown. How is that going to work?