Residents say the options currently under consideration could fail to address the neighborhood’s main mobility needs. In particular, they criticize the study of a route along the Tenor Fleta-Goya-Portillo-Avenida Ciudad de Soria corridor and advocate a solution that would connect San José with the city center, Delicias and Zaragoza-Delicias station. They also point to the current difficulties of traveling from the district to Miguel Servet Hospital without making transfers.
For the San José Neighborhood Association, the debate is especially important because of the district’s population, which it estimates at nearly 70,000 residents, and because of the traffic and public transport problems that, it says, persist in the area. It also warns that various urban redevelopment projects under way in areas such as the surroundings of Portillo, Coso, Paseo María Agustín and Paseo Pamplona should take the future infrastructure into account to avoid new construction work if the line is ultimately built.
THEY CALL FOR A CENTRAL ROLE FOR THE SAN JOSÉ NEIGHBORHOOD
The neighborhood association also believes that turning the future line into a simple branch could result in longer intervals between services. It recalls existing complaints about the frequency of several urban bus routes, including routes 40 and 25. Against this backdrop, it is calling for the route to serve the district as a whole rather than concentrating investment in the city’s expanding areas.
Finally, the association is calling for a participatory process that it considers "genuine, planned and binding," with neighborhoods involved in defining mobility policies. The city council, for its part, has said that the University of Zaragoza study will be preliminary and strategic, and will serve to compare alternatives from a technical, functional, urban and economic perspective before future actions are decided.
