As is often the case, we need to go back to the time of the dictator General Primo de Rivera and his Minister of Public Works, the Count of Guadalhorce, to discover the origins of this railway line. Under the 1926 railway expansion plan, new lines were to be built to create a truly nationwide railway network. This particular line was to connect Talavera de la Reina (Toledo) with Villanueva de la Serena (Badajoz), passing through the monastery town of Guadalupe (Cáceres), thereby linking up the Tajo and Guadiana valleys
Work began at a healthy rate towards the end of the 1920s. Vast numbers of workmen helped by former farm workers cut and tunnelled into the virgin hills and poured tons of concrete to throw elegant slender viaducts over rivers.
The civil war and its hardships was a death blow to the project. The post-war years, the rise of the private car, and the depopulation of rural areas all conspired against the railway building project. The works languished until someone eventually pulled the plug. By the time the project was abandoned all the earthworks had been completed except for some 20 km of the Villuercas section, and all the stations had been built. All that was left to do was to lay the tracks and install the signalling. In fact some track was actually laid between Villanueva and Logrosán and this stretch of line was delivered to Renfe. The line even had some staff appointed to run it, but now even those tracks are just a memory |
