Environment

In 1860, the railway line Barcelona – Manresa – Lleida arrived in Tàrrega. This fact and the construction years before 1854, of the road from Montblanc to La Seu, and later the road from Tàrrega to Balaguer and Alcarràs, as well as the real road between Madrid and Barcelona, located the still Vila de Tàrrega, as a strategic point of communication between the sea and the mountains and between inland Catalonia and industrial Catalonia.

The existence of these infrastructures was basic for the future development of the commercial and services sector of Urgell for much of the 20th century. The area of influence of Tàrrega and the neighboring towns went far beyond its natural region. The new investments attracted population and labor from La Segarra and Urgell. The generation of wealth promoted social, civic, educational and cultural initiatives, which laid the foundations of a cultural, commercial and industrial spirit so characteristic of our lands.

The heritage complex of the Tàrrega train station preserves, in its northern area, an important and unique railway space from the 19th century, of great historical value and made up of a pier or high-loading platform with well-worked stone cairns. on top of which is a warehouse with wooden handicrafts, the iron structure of a flat tile shed, which was being restored, and a crane located next to the road, also very well restored by the ‘La Solana’ municipal training school.

In the publication URTX nº 10 of the Museu Comarcal de l’Urgell, Roger Costa Solé, graduate in Geography and History and technician of ethnological heritage of the Department of Culture of the Generalitat de Catalunya and Carles Garcia Hermosilla, Director of the Museu Industrial del Ter They state: “In Tàrrega the station still has an interesting set. The most notable is the loading and unloading dock, with a wooden shed and iron structure that must be from the beginning of the century and the crane of which we must highlight its wooden shaft, made in Britain”. The crane retains at its bottom the name of the Lloyds – Foster & Company, and the name of the English town of Wednesbury, halfway between Manchester and Birmingham.

The heritage complex of the road docks is municipal, the result of an urban planning agreement signed between RENFE and Tàrrega City Council in 2003. This agreement made it possible to recover an industrial heritage of great historical value for the city, as well as the construction of a public car park and the start of the rehabilitation work of the crane and the set of loading docks by the La Solana de Tàrrega School. The aim of the rehabilitation was to adapt them and integrate them as a public space for civic and cultural use. Rehabilitation work was halted by political decision of the municipal government in 2011.

We trust that the future projects planned in this place will take advantage of, respect and integrate the patrimonial and historical set of the docks of the route. They are a cultural attraction that everyone likes and that over time will become a must-see for tourists.

Jaume Ramon Solé.

1. URTX number 10. “Patrimoni Industrial de l’Urgell”, 1997. Roger Costa Solé and Carles Garcia Hermosilla.