ADIF (, an acronym of Administrador de Infraestructuras Ferroviarias) is a Spanish state-owned railway infrastructure manager. This state owned company reports to the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility. ADIF is charged with the management of most of Spain's railway infrastructure, that is the track, signaling and stations.[1] It was formed in 2005 in response to European Union requirements to separate the natural monopoly of infrastructure management from the competitive operations of running train services. It is the legal successor of Renfe, Feve (Ferrocarriles de Vía Estrecha), and GIF (Gestor de Infraestructuras Ferroviarias).
History
ADIF was created as the result of Railway Sector Act, which arises from the transposition of European Directives that required all large European national railways to independently manage the infrastructure and trains on it. The ultimate goal of this legislation was to permit any other rail operator seeking to access the network to do so on equal terms with the incumbent operator (in the case of Spain, Renfe) and thus promote free competition. The Renfe division became effective on 1 January 2005 between the two companies: A similar operation was conducted on 31 December 2012 with Feve, a company that managed the narrow gauge railways. ADIF took charge of all narrow gauge infrastructures not transferred to the