Metro line 9 revolutionizes accessibility of Mas Blau and Zona Franca logistics parks

• • The new line connects the two largest metropolitan industrial parks: Mas Blau and Zona Franca
• • L’any que ve, l’entrada en servei de l’L10, completarà la cobertura del polígon de la Zona Franca

On 12 February, a few days before the start of this year’s Mobile World Congress, the new metro line 9 was inaugurated, connecting the fairgrounds in l’Hospitalet with the El Prat airport, as well as the two largest industrial parks in the metropolitan area: Zona Franca and Mas Blau.

The Parc Logístic and Mecabarna stops on this new line serve this large industrial park, which has 6 million m2, nearly 70,000 workers, and roughly 300 companies. Likewise, the Mas Blau industrial park –part of the Barcelona Catalonia initiative- now has a metro stop that largely makes private vehicles unnecessary as metro L9 between l’Hospitalet and Zona Universitària also connects to three other metro lines, commuter trains (Rodalies) and local trains (Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat). Nevertheless, the Zona Franca industrial park won’t have full service until L10 opens, which is expected to be in 2017.

So, with the arrival of the metro, the Zona Franca industrial park now boasts even better connections, as this international logistics platform is located right next to the port of Barcelona, very close to the El Prat airport, and also right by the Can Tunis freight station, with international gauge tracts to the French border. The park also has road access to the beltways and motorways that connect the city and its metropolitan area to the rest of the Peninsula and to Europe.

The metro will also bring public transport to Marina del Prat Vermell, in the former industrial area of Barcelona’s Sants-Montjuïc neighborhood, surrounded by the port of Barcelona and Zona Franca, which is currently undergoing urban regeneration to become one of the most modern, sustainable neighborhoods in Barcelona.