Fast Tagging A Metro Train

OK, so this is old (2006) but thought I should pop this up on the blog as it shows a particularly fast graffiti artist at work in the Madrid Metro.

glumbert – The fast way to tag a train

AVE Train – Success at last

Barcelona welcomed its first 220mph bullet train from Madrid yesterday. It arrived eight minutes early. Well, actually, it arrived six months late because of delays in the construction of the final couple of kilometres at the Barcelona end. Six months of works that have been recorded gleefully by Madrid based media outlets who took great delight in showing suffering Barcelona commuters whose local trains were severely disrupted during this period and also pointing out that the capital’s end of the project was completed on time.

The journey equates to approx 320 miles, which is roughly the distance from London to Newcastle. The AVE train covers this distance in 2 hours 45 minutes.

Most Madrilenos would have preferred an AVE line to Valencia, which is considered as the ‘Playa de Madrid’ (Madrid’s Beach) and where many own a holiday apartment or chalet. No right-thinking Madrileno intentionally goes to Barcelona unless it’s for work or an unavoidable family occasion – christening, wedding, funeral etc. Instead, they prefer to sniffily ignore it and regard the Catalunyan city as a terrible mistake wrought on Spain by a cruel and unfeeling God. The feeling is, apparently, mutual.

Madrid Metro

Let’s go down – down to the underground. The Madrid Metro is very well run, generally tidy and the train carriages are clean. You get buskers in the tourist area stations and there are escalators too, just like London. It’s only 1 Euro for 1 viaje (trip) and that trip can be wherever you want – 1 stop or 30. There’s also a ten-trip carnet option or a monthly pass option but at the moment I’m too embarassed with my Spanish (or, let’s admit it, too scared) to try and ask for one at the ticket office. Some of the larger stations also boast video screens to keep commuters occupied and some of the newer stations (they’re still adding routes and lines as I write) are quite space age – you know, lots of tinted glass, whizzy lifts and neon signs and stuff. Apparently it’s the second largest metro network in Europe after London at about 280 km with 280 stations. The UrbanRail.net website has some good info about it if you want to know more.