Delicias Station, wich turned into the Spanish official Railway Museum in December of 1984, is a result of the industrial revolution and one of the most characteristic buildings in Madrid. The construction was started on 1979 and just a year later it was inaugurated by the king Alfonso XII.
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For a very long time, many people connected Delicias Station with fhe French engineer Gustave Eiffel, something absolutely wrong. Today we can say, without any doubt, that the proyect of the building was only made by the French engineer Emile Cacheliévre. He managed the works along with the Spanish engineer Calleja. Both of them were contracted by the Compañía del Ferrocarril de Madrid a Ciudad Real y Badajoz (Madrid to Ciudad Real and Badajoz Railway company) .
The metallic structure was buildt at the Fives Lille factory in Brussels. From this factory the pieces were sent to Madrid where they were assembled. The construction solved the essential necessity of railway stations in the steam locomotives period because it prevented floor obstruction and steam condensation.
The station structure is similar to the ones developed in the XIX century in Europe, and consisted on two parallel bodies with a cover between them. The novelty was that the arrival platform was next to the rails and in front of the departure platform. This platform held the most significant part of the station: the vestibule and the waiting room.
This building had a functional character, following the most advanced architectural principles of the time. The most important materials were iron and glass, that were combinated with perfection. In spite of the few ornamentation used, the building posess an amazing expressiveness wich converts the station principal building in an enormous transparent bright space.
The colourfull note of the building is found in the outside, with a great decorative interest that also reminds one of the typical Spanish styles: the mudejar, very used in Madrid in that period. One of the main characteristics of this style are the red and black pressed bricks.
When Delicias Station was about to be buildt, Madrid had another two stations: Atocha and Príncipe Pio. Both of them were only two loading platforms at that time, so Delicias was really the first monumental station in Madrid.
On the other hand, the existence of those two stations was very important to decide where to place the new building. This was the reason for its location in the south of Madrid. For this reasson, the project was included in the enlargement plans of the engineer Carlos María de Castro, between the Atocha and Príncipe Pio stations in an area delimited by a ring line wich connected the three stations of the city.
Delicias emerged, at first, as the terminal station of the Madrid to Ciudad Real and Badajoz railway company. Nevertheless after 1880 such company was absorbed by the Madrid to Zaragoza and Alicante company. As this last one already had Atocha Station, Delicias Station was eventually sold. The building was then bought by Madrid to Cáceres and Portugal railway company, and as a consecuence it was turned into an international station that connected two european capitals.
Circulation between Madrid and Lisboa, consisted on direct trains and mixed traffic, dedicated to both, freight and passengers transport. Nevertheless those trains used to go through very small villages. Therefore, passengers traffic was not very important, and consecuently freight services were the main activity, especially to transport cork, cereal and cattle.
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Photo Hobert. 1879. Railway Museum Archive. |
Anyway there were some important passenger trains from Delicias Station such as El Rápido, converted into the Lusitania Exprées, and trains like the Correo Exprées, the Ligero and the Omnibus or Correos. Actually, the actual king Juan Carlos used that train to come back to Spain after many years of exile. Nevertheless his arrival was not at Delicias Station, but at Villaverde Station. From there, he was taken to El Cerro de los Angeles (Angels Hill) for the celebration of an important historic and political act: his consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, as the successor of his grandfather, the king Alfonso XIII and as the envoy of his father, Juan de Borbón.
In any case, all services we have talked about were only realized until the first of July of 1969. From that date the station was definitely closed to passengers and freight and all services were then transfered to Atocha and Chammartín stations. Delicias went through uncertain moments as nobody knew about its future.
Eleven years later there was an official preocupation about Delicias Station. Renfe took the iniciative, because by that time the company needed a place to keep its train collection. At last, the railway company decided to used Delicias Station as a railway museum.
In 1880 took place an important event for the future of Delicias station: the opening of the process wich declared the station as a National Historic Monument. At the same time, an agreement was signed between Renfe and the Ministerio de Cultura (Culture Department), deciding that Delicias Station would hold the National Science and Technology Museum and the Railway Museum.
The Spanish Culture Department decided to join in the restoration of the building as a way of cooperation with Renfe. They invested about 370 millions of pesetas in order to do restoration works and to adapt the station for its new role. Eventually, the museum opened its doors the 19 th of December of 1984.
By means of this restoration, Madrid received a unique historic building of great artistic importance that soon became one of the most significant examples of the industrial architecture developed at the end of the XIX century in Spain.
Inmaculada García Lozano.
Railway Historian.
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