In 2023, Metro de Madrid had 24,206 incidents that involved delays, of which almost 90% were caused by a lack of drivers, according to the daily operations tables to which EL PAÍS has had access.
The unions relate these shortages to an endemic staff shortage that is harming passengers and an impossibility of meeting the number of trains in circulation considered ideal: each incident means that there are fewer trains on a line than they should.
There were 59 delays daily due to lack of drivers.
These data are known a week after the Madrid president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, announced that lines 6 and 8 will be the first to have driverless trains.
The announcement has generated uncertainty among a staff of 1,891 train drivers, who say they have seen for years how the person responsible for this transport system, the Community of Madrid, skimps on personal resources.
“It is clear that today an adequate service is not being provided,” says the general secretary of the Machinists' Union, José Luis Cejudo.
“In order to meet the objectives, we should have more than 2,000 drivers.”
Madrid Metro must comply with service tables established by the Regional Transport Consortium.
It is a frequently unfulfilled aspiration that causes excessive frequencies and often crowds greater than the comfort objective of four passengers per square meter inside a car.
This staffing problem puts stress on the system at times of greatest demand, such as the first stages of the morning rush hour (7:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m.) and midday rush hour (2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.).
The worst time of the week, in which the most incidents are recorded, is two in the afternoon on Fridays.
These days the afternoon rush hour is brought forward because many people leave work early, the service tables foresee a reinforcement with more trains, but there is no staff to drive them, according to an employee, who is familiar with the train drivers' shifts.
Incidents also accumulate during the subway openings on weekends at six in the morning, possibly due to staff releases.
The same happens in the period of the year in which the train drivers' vacations are concentrated, August, another moment of tension for the system, but not the only one of the year: it is also the moment in which Madrid receives the most visitors, the Christmas.
On Thursday, December 7, the streets of Madrid were bustling with tourists and locals shopping and enjoying the Christmas lighting.
On peak days and hours, like this case, Metro must increase the number of trains in accordance with the conditions established by the Regional Transport Consortium, a company that depends on the Community of Madrid.
Between six and seven in the afternoon, 267 trains were to run on the 16 lines of the network.
However, the data shows that 44 trains were missing (on lines 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12).
In all cases the cause was a lack of personnel, except in line 2, where the reason was a lack of material.
On line 4 there are seven trains missing out of the 25 that were supposed to circulate on that section.
It was a moment of maximum demand, but Metro failed the city.
Every time a train is missing, a delay is generated that travelers immediately notice.
Covering the gap with a new train causes additional delays because those responsible for the command post located in Vallecas must momentarily hold back the next convoy so that the intervals between trains are homogeneous.
“If rush hour arrives and there are no drivers, many trains stay in the depots,” explains Alfonso Blanco, organizational secretary of CC OO at Metro de Madrid.
“The company has not responded to our expansion claims for years.
They say they hire new drivers, but in reality they only replace those who retire.”
The number of Metro drivers has fallen from the peak of 2,078 in 2012 to 1,891 last year, almost 200 less, according to data managed by the unions.
Meanwhile, the number of travelers has grown in that time from 601 million to 662 million last year.
The staff has to do more with less: the number of travelers has increased by 10%, but almost 10% fewer drivers are working - the unions' staff figures are slightly lower than those offered by the company, but the workers are They complain that the official numbers disguise reality because they include employees taking partial retirement.
A Metro spokesperson denies the reality shown by the company's own data.
“There is no lack of machinists,” he tells this newspaper.
“There may have been some specific incidents.”
This spokesperson does not answer the question about the degree of compliance with the Transport Consortium's objectives, but still adds: “It is very high.”
The Consortium can sanction Metro if it fails to comply with the agreed commitments of waiting time for passengers and occupancy rate of the trains, which are set at a minimum of 93% (for the entire network) and 90% (for each one of the lines).
For example, there is a commitment to not exceed six minutes of waiting and four passengers per square meter during the morning rush hour.
For the afternoon, it is set at 7 minutes, 30 seconds, and 3.5 travelers per square meter, respectively.
The maximum applicable penalty corresponds to 3% of the income accrued based on the billing of the application period.
In any case, the agreement includes extenuating causes, such as non-compliance occurring due to suspensions or stoppages of equipment and facilities, due to causes beyond Metro's control, due to strikes, due to actions to improve the network, or for safety reasons.
Alberto Oliver, deputy of Más Madrid, criticizes the “worrying situation” of the company, and points out that its origin is in “the lack of investments in maintenance and personnel in recent years, which have led to a permanent failure to comply with the commitments of puntuality".
And remember: “This situation is derived from a progressive deterioration, where the net worth of the suburban has lost more than 70% of its value, giving rise to a shortage of material and human resources that make the quality of the service increasingly lower. ”.
This manpower problem is also observed in the personnel who serve users.
Ghost stations are becoming more and more common, as recently shown by information from the media InfoBae, which estimated there were 81,000 unfilled shifts last year.
In this context, the president announced last week that in 2030 driverless trains will be running on lines 6 and 8, which has unleashed the staff's fear of losing their jobs.
One day after the announcement, the Minister of Transportation, Jorge Rodrigo, met with workers' representatives and assured them that "there would be no job destruction."
This message, the unions warn, does not exclude a reduction in personnel in a workforce that now has 7,161 employees, because the company could stop replacing retirees.
Subscribe here
to our daily newsletter about Madrid.
Subscribe to continue reading
Read without limits
Keep reading
I am already a subscriber
_