Data sheet:
- Manufacturer: Casa Girona.
- Measurements:
- Width: 3.205 m
- Height: 4.314 m
- Length: 21.900 m
- Began service: 1926
- Decommissioned: 1979.
- Restored: 1981.
History of the vehicle
The 126 carriage was one of the 10 carriages that on June 10th 1926 inaugurated the second underground line in Barcelona, the Transversal Metro, now known as L1. That first section of the line linked the Bordeta and Plaça Catalunya stations and had 9 stations and 4 km of tunnel.
The construction project of the Transversal Metro was born with the idea of connecting the train services of the two companies that ran to the city, Compañia de Caminos de Hierro del Norte and Ferrocarriles de Madrid, Zaragoza and Alicante. This is why the Transversal Metro was built using the width of train tracks, the so-called Iberian width measuring 1,672 mm.
Due to this special track width, the Transversal Metro was inaugurated with large carriages that stood out from the trains running on the other metro line at the time, the current L3 Grand Metro, which had a conventional width of 1,435 mm. In fact, these 100 series carriages were until 1967 the largest urban automobiles in the world.
For the users of 1926, seeing a 100 series arrive at a Transversal Metro station, as a single carriage (they were self-propelled and ran individually without forming a train), with unusual dimensions, with Modernist style decoration, oval windows and details in black on yellow, must have caused such an expectation that they were called "rolling living rooms".
Soon after and even though it was aimed to be a train service link, the Transversal Metro service consolidated as an urban metro line with a large passenger capacity.
In 1959, the 100 series carriages were modernised. The oval windows were replaced by rectangular ones, the perpendicular seats were replaced by long benches increasing carriage capacity, and they were painted blue and off white. With this new image they ran forming three-carriage trains, until they were withdrawn from service throughout the seventies.
In 1981, carriages 125, 126 and 131 recovered their original 1926 aspect and circulated until 1988 on the Transversal line, now called L1, on Sundays mornings.
