Cross a few bridges and nineteen tunnels. It is not a metaphor for the life that awaits Jean Castex in Matignon but that, daily, of the little yellow Train from Cerdagne which crosses the Pyrenees, from the medieval city of Villefranche-de-Conflent to Latour-de-Carol , via Olette, Fontpédrouse - St Thomas les Bains, Mont-Louis-La Cabanasse, Font-Romeu and Bourg-Madame.
Also read: Reshuffle: Jean Castex, the “M. deconfinement "powered by Matignon
The new Prime Minister knows this train by heart, the first to benefit from an aerostatic brake system. He is even the first of the defenders. In 2015, he also opposed its privatization.
Two years later, Jean Castex published a work at Talaia, a publishing house based in Canet-en-Roussillon, on the line which will be extended by this tortillard in the blood and gold colors of Catalonia. In The railway line from Perpignan to Villefranche-de-Conflent (Prelude to the Cerdagne line) , he thus replaces these 41 kilometers of railroad, built after numerous procrastinations between 1863 and 1877, in a national context.
A line that goes through Prades, of which the new prime minister has been the mayor since 2008 (he has just been re-elected there in the first round of the municipal elections with 75% of the votes).
This native of Vic-Fezensac (in Gers), son of a schoolteacher who became an enarque, discovered this region in 1970, in Valcebollère. Married to a Catalan from Ria-Sirach, Jean Castex, father of four daughters, beyond his mandate in Prades, is also president of the Community of Communes Conflent Canigó and departmental advisor of the canton of Catalan Pyrenees.
In his book, volume 7 of a collection entitled "The Carnets of the Yellow Train", he thus evokes the proactive policy of the Second Empire and the emerging Third Republic in terms of railway equipment. And how this policy could have shaped the destiny and the geography of the Pyrénées-Orientales.
"Passionate about history, he devotes his leisure time to reading and takes pleasure in sharing his knowledge at conferences he offers voluntarily or during Heritage Days where he gladly puts on his guide cap" , can we read about Jean Castex on his publisher's site.
