开往世界尽头的火车通车啦

Europe

欧洲版块

The train in Spain

西班牙的火车

To the end of the earth

直到世界的尽头

Spain's high-speed network reaches far-off Galicia

西班牙的高速铁路网络延伸到了遥远的加利西亚

FOR CENTURIES the main way to Galicia, Spain's north-western corner, was on foot, on the pilgrims' trail to Santiago de Compostela.

几个世纪以来，前往西班牙西北角加利西亚的主要方式是徒步，这是朝圣者前往圣地亚哥德孔波斯特拉的路线。

Poor roads meant that, until a decade or two ago, the drive from Madrid took nine hours.

十年或二十年前，糟糕的路况意味着，从马德里开车过去仍需要9个小时。

Recent improvements have cut the trip to the closest Galician city, Ourense, to about five.

近来的改善已经将去往距离最近的加利西亚城市乌伦斯的行程，减少到5小时左右。

Now the journey can be made in two hours and 15 minutes thanks to Galicia's first connection with Spain's enviable high-speed railway network.

现在，由于加利西亚首次连接进了西班牙令人羡慕的高速铁路网络，这段旅程只需2小时15分钟。

Next year the line should be extended to Santiago, the regional capital, and A Corua, its biggest city.

明年，这条线路将延伸到地区首府圣地亚哥和最大的城市拉科鲁尼亚。

"Cinderella can now travel in a bigger and more comfortable car," said Ourense's mayor, Gonzalo Pérez Jácome, using his nickname for his city, which he says is treated like an unloved stepchild.

乌伦斯市市长冈萨罗·佩雷斯·查科姆说：“灰姑娘现在可以乘坐更大更舒适的汽车旅行了。”他用自己的绰号来称呼这座城市，他说乌伦斯市被当作不受宠爱的继子来对待。

No one wants to be left out of the system—Spain has the biggest high-speed rail network in the world after China's—but he doubts that the new extension will bring dramatic changes.

西班牙拥有仅次于中国的世界上最大的高速铁路网，没有人想被排除在这个系统之外。但是他怀疑新的铁路扩建是否会带来剧变。

Spaniards have long been leaving poorer rural areas for better opportunities in richer cities.

长期以来，西班牙人离开较贫穷的农村地区，到较富裕的城市寻找更好的发展机会。

Politicians in rural areas lament this.

农村地区的政治家对此有些抱怨。

But it is not obvious that pricey infrastructure will do much to curb it.

但昂贵的基础建设是否能起到很大的抑制作用还不清楚。

Mr Jácome notes that Zamora, until recently the high-speed trains' last stop en route to Galicia, has gained weekend tourists but continued to lose population since their arrival in 2015.

查科姆先生指出，直到最近，前往加利西亚的高铁最后一站萨莫拉建成了，虽然周末游客人数有所增加，但自2015年以来，人口仍在持续减少。

In any case, Galicia has been doing well.

不管怎么说，加利西亚地区一直做得很好。

It was once a byword for isolation and poverty, "the end of the world", as the name of its westernmost point, Cape Finisterre, indicates.

它曾经是孤立和贫穷的代名词，正如其最西端的菲尼斯特雷角的名字所表明的那样，是“世界的尽头”。

So many Galicians emigrated that gallego is still synonymous with "Spaniard" in parts of Latin America.

如此多的加利西亚人移居国外，以至于在拉丁美洲部分地区，加列戈仍然是“西班牙人”的同义词。

But GDP per person, 66% of the national average in 1955, is now 92% of it.

但人均GDP，在1955年是全国平均水平的66%，现在是92%。

ngel de la Fuente of FEDEA, an economic think-tank, points to fish processing, carmaking and clothing (Inditex, the parent company of Zara and other brands, is based there) and reasonably business-friendly politics, though he says a single cause of its catch-up is hard to identify.

经济智库FEDEA的恩格尔·德拉富恩特说，尽管他很难找出经济迎头赶上的单一原因，但他指出了渔业加工、汽车制造和服装业（Zara的母公司Inditex和其他品牌的公司就设在那里）以及合理的商业友好政策是一些影响因素。

Another fix for Spain's regional disparities has been proposed by the Socialist-led national government: opening new state bodies outside the capital.

社会党领导的国家政府提出了另一个解决西班牙地区差距的办法：在首都以外设立新的国家机构。

Many bigwigs in the conservative People's Party (PP) say this would be pointless.

保守的人民党中的许多大人物说这将毫无意义。

Galicia's leader, the PP's moderate Alberto Nuez Feijóo, has a warmer reaction, noting that it makes little sense to put the country's Institute of Oceanography in landlocked Madrid.

加利西亚省的领导人，人民党的温和派阿尔贝托·努涅斯·费约对此反应较为热烈，他指出，将该国的海洋学研究所设在内陆城市马德里毫无意义。

Once, people would have said the same about putting world-conquering companies and ultra-modern trains in Galicia.

曾经，人们对在加利西亚建立征服世界的大公司和超现代化的火车也是同样的反应。