More than 120 years of history

To better achieve its objectives and diversify its activity, CMU launched a wide range of businesses that also contributed to the development of the Linear City, notably the purchase and sale of land, the construction and sale of housing, the operation of tram and railway lines, the manufacture and supply of electricity, the channelling and distribution of water, a brick and building-materials factory, a printing house, a savings bank, an amusement park, a restaurant, a velodrome, and more.

The Linear City project considered its connection with the capital to be vitally important. To this end, the first railways linking the Linear City with Madrid entered service in 1898. CMU acquired the Cuatro Caminos–Tetuán tram and built the Tetuán–Chamartín branch line to connect with the Linear City to the north. It also undertook the southern connection, building the branch line from Ventas to the Concepción district. And in 1899 the central tramway was laid along Arturo Soria street, running the 5.2 km of what became known as the first neighbourhood.

CMU continued to develop its businesses prosperously and the Linear City expanded considerably, until the outbreak of the First World War and the resulting shortage of capital and raw materials plunged the company into a deep crisis, from which it could not recover until the end of that decade. However, many of the projects then under way had to be abandoned for good, among them the extension of the Linear City through the second and third neighbourhoods.

By the mid-1920s, CMU had recovered much of its business activity, although some of its lines of business, such as its construction service, never returned to their pre-crisis levels of the previous decade. The linear theory devised by its founder achieved a certain renown beyond our borders, and CMU was a member of the International Association of Linear Cities, established in Paris in 1929.

The arrival of the Civil War and the critical economic situation that Spain endured in the following years led to the definitive abandonment of the Linear City's development, which was limited to the first neighbourhood, that is, the stretch between Alcalá street and San Luis avenue.

In the post-war period, CMU continued to manage its assets and administer the land holdings it owned. It also continued to run the tram lines it held under concession until the end of 1951, when it reached an agreement for the lines to revert to Madrid City Council, which from the following year began operating them through the Municipal Transport Company (EMT).

In 1966, Madrid City Council included in its new General Plan the project to redevelop Arturo Soria street to turn it into a "park avenue", reaching an agreement for the Council to acquire the land occupied by that road, which until then had still been owned by Compañía Madrileña de Urbanización.