At a meeting of the Spanish Senate in late April 2026, Alvaro Fernandez Heredia, President of Spanish state railway Renfe, spoke in favour of reuniting Renfe with infrastructure operator Adif. His statement was made during the parliamentary inquiry into the fatal accident at Adamuz. Heredia justified his position by arguing that rail operations and infrastructure are technically closely linked within the railway system and that a separation of responsibilities is therefore not appropriate. As examples, he cited metro networks and the organisational models in Germany, France and Italy, where infrastructure and operations are managed separately but operate under a single state umbrella. He also referred to the reform in the UK, where operations and infrastructure are being consolidated within Great British Railways (GBR). Spain had separated operations and infrastructure in January 2005 as part of market liberalisation.
