Spain’s national railway company, Renfe, spends more than €400,000 to remove graffiti from Andalucian trains

EVERY year, thousands of trains are vandalized and last year’s graffiti cleaning costs tallied €413,000 in Andalucia alone.

In addition to the cost, there are the delays caused by the removal of these trains for their restoration; and the extra costs of increasing security.

The costs generated last year on Renfe trains throughout Spain amounted to an eye-watering €25.2 million, an average of €69,000 euros per day, according to data provided by Renfe in a press release.

An expense the tax paying Spaniard assumes, given that Renfe, the main rail network in Spain, is a public company.

Over the past year, vandals—33 of which were arrested last year by Renfe security staff—painted nearly 80,000 metres of train surfaces and 3,559 graffiti intrusions were reported, which represents an average of nearly ten acts of vandalism of this type per day.

In 2022, 10,500 working hours were spent cleaning trains. The paint used by graffiti artists, approximately 16,000 litres, is made up of toxic substances such as benzene, which has ‘harmful effects’ on the environment and people.

The removal of graffiti requires trains to be moved to cleaning centres and the electricity consumption of these movements is equivalent to the consumption of 400,000 kilowatt hours or 36 million light bulbs lit for one hour, or the consumption of more than 44,000 homes for one day.

In Andalucia, 66 acts of graffiti vandalism were recorded last year, affecting an area of 1,784 square metres.

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