Chances to be granted "direct" by ATC Spain for enroute IFR

You cannot base your flight planning on the shortcuts you might obtain en-route. What you file should be something that you can realistically fly.

In the end of June I flew LFBP-LPCS and at some point I encountered the same problem you now do: the proposed routing took me to the south of Madrid although I knew I had previously generated a route to the north of Madrid. I did not dig too much into the cause, but

• By setting the upper limit of the altitude range to FL150 or more yields a better routing
• Any attempt at lowering the altitude of some parts of the route yields the error PROF194: DGO G52 CUCAS IS NOT AVAILABLE IN FL RANGE F085..F145 although the AIP says that the route does exist in that range. Looking up the IFPS error code it means: The profile calculation for each flight plan will check the calculated arrival time and flight level of the flight for each part of a route, and cross-check this time against the published availability conditions for that part of that route at that time.
• Incidentally FL150 is, in Spain, the altitude above which the airspace is B-RNAV.

I resolved the issue by filing for FL150 or FL160 (can’t remember). I did fly at FL150 or FL160 because the winds were favourable, but I got the feeling that had I not requested to climb, I would not have been required to.

The route I flew was
LFBP N0176F100 SOVOS9E SOVOS G17 BIDAC DCT URUNA R10 XAXUS/N0185F150 B190 DGO G52 RIVRO/N0176F100 DCT ABRAT DCT MANEL LPCS

You will however probably get a DCT FTM which is the first point on the LPCS STAR.

While digging into this, I happened to generate a new route at lower levels
LFBP N0181F120 SOVOS9W SOVOS DCT URUNA R10 XAXUS B190 CEGAM/N0176F100 B190 DGO G52 RIVRO DCT DIGAL DCT LIS LPCS

But now both autorouter and EuroFPL claim that XAXUS does not exist… Go figure.

The AIP for Spain lists SSN on B190 instead of XAXUS (they are the same place). But when I replace XAXUS with SSN in the route, autorouter says Airway segment SSN B190 CEGAM does not exist although it does in the AIP. EuroFPL however does accept SSN.

Another funny issue is that I am not able to get a route ending in FTM to validate although it is the first point on the LPCS STAR

Aviathor wrote:

You cannot base your flight planning on the shortcuts you might obtain en-route. What you file should be something that you can realistically fly.

This is true, of course. I’ve been to Spain quite a few times and in my experience Spanish ATC is very reluctant to give directs.

This
SOVOS9W SOVOS DCT URUNA R10 SSN B190 CEGAM/N0176F120 B190 DGO VFR RIVRO IFR DCT DIGAL DCT LIS
works.

If they require you to climb to FL150 around DGO, you cancel IFR, then request IFR when you arrive at RIVRO. Otherwise you continue IFR at the altitude you were prior to DGO. Chances are they won’t require you to climb. The problem is that in case you lose comms, if IFR you are required to follow your flight plan, including filed altitude, unless you are VMC in which case you are supposed to land at a suitable field.

Spanish ATC is very reluctant to give directs

That’s my experience too from many trips down there, and I put it down to some of the ATC having almost no ELP so they cannot understand the request. They have often not even understood “request xx degrees left to avoid”. That has certainly been obvious in various other contexts including dealing with airliners at a major airport like Valencia. The default procedure is to ignore the call, or decline, because it leaves no ELP related evidence on the tape

They do give you directs if you ask nicely. During my recent trip there were plenty of directs and negotiations about cruising level going on with airliners. I did myself get a direct that had to be coordinated with the next sector.

I got some pretty good directs on Monday. It helps it you help them a bit by saying “request direct xxxx, which is 10 degrees left of current heading”.