What you can see on the Gran Vía webcams
The Callao camera looks down on the crowds at the heart of the street. From the Plaza de España end, another looks up the whole avenue between stone façades towards the centre. Closer to street level, two more show the crossing with San Bernardo and the stretch near Calle del Clavel, with buses, taxis and shoppers. All of them are still images renewed every few minutes, and the traffic centre can turn or zoom them, so the framing sometimes changes.
Madrid's Gran Vía at Callao, the crowds by day and night
Callao is where the Gran Vía is busiest, and this council camera looks down on it from high on a building at the junction. The wide pavements are usually full: shoppers by day, theatre and cinema crowds in the evening, and a steady stream of people well past midnight. Between them run the bus and taxi lanes, with the façades of the avenue stretching away behind.
Use it to see how lively the centre is before heading out, or simply what the weather is doing over the city. The camera belongs to the traffic centre, which can turn and zoom it, so it does not always show the same stretch. Each picture is a still image stamped with the date and time; the reload button brings the most recent one.
Gran Vía webcam, Madrid: the view from Plaza de España
The city's traffic centre keeps this camera high on a building at the Plaza de España end of the Gran Vía, looking east up the avenue. On the left are the front of the Teatro Coliseum and an old advertising kiosk; down the middle run the bus and taxi lanes, and on the right a broad pavement lined with trees and newspaper stands. The street rises gently into the distance between stone façades of the 1920s.
It is the best of the Madrid cameras for the feel of the city: the blue-and-white city buses, the flow of people on both pavements and the light on the buildings. The traffic centre can zoom or turn it, so the framing sometimes changes. It is a still image, not a video: the reload button brings the latest one.
Gran Vía webcam: the junction with San Bernardo
Near the western end of the Gran Vía, this council camera looks down on the crossing with Calle de San Bernardo from a building on the corner. White taxis and cars turn across the zebra crossings, people wait on the corners and walk past the shop windows, and the avenue continues on the right towards Callao between tall stone buildings.
It is closer to street level than the other Gran Vía cameras, so you can see what people are wearing and how crowded the pavements are. Like all the council's cameras it sends a still picture every few minutes, stamped with the time.
Gran Vía webcam: near Calle del Clavel
Towards the eastern end of the Gran Vía, close to where it meets Calle de Alcalá, this camera looks along the avenue from just above the traffic. City buses and cars come up the street towards the camera, shop fronts and banners line the left-hand pavement, and pedestrians cross in waves at the lights.
It is the view for the everyday bustle of the street, busiest in the late afternoon and on weekend evenings. The picture is a still image renewed every few minutes.
Spain's Broadway
The avenue did not grow: it was cut through the old city between 1910 and 1929, sweeping away a tangle of narrow streets to link the east of Madrid with the west. Its buildings are a catalogue of the styles of the time, from the domed Metrópolis at the eastern end to the Telefónica tower, once the tallest building in Europe, and the Carrión building with its Schweppes sign at Callao. Its cinemas and theatres earned it the nickname of Madrid's Broadway, and musicals still fill several of them.
When to watch the Gran Vía
Madrid is one hour ahead of the UK and Ireland. The Gran Vía is at its busiest from late afternoon to well after midnight, especially on Fridays and Saturdays, and in December, when the Christmas lights go up. In summer the afternoons are very hot and the street fills up after dark.
Around the Gran Vía
The Puerta del Sol and the Plaza Mayor are a few minutes' walk south of Callao, and the Royal Palace and the Temple of Debod are just beyond the Plaza de España. The Cibeles fountain and the Paseo del Prado lie at the eastern end, and the Madrid page covers them.
