ZAP
Porto will take the first step towards “change” in mobility, with the implementation of free transport from 2027. Braga and Guimarães will follow. But there are precautions that city halls must take.
2027 will bring good news to the people of Porto, with free public transport.
To , the municipality explains that the measure will be exclusively for residents of the city of Porto, Porto Card holders.
“They are currently making every effort to develop the product/service and ensuring all necessary coordination with the external entities involved”, he guarantees.
After the example of the city Invicta, according to the same newspaper, Braga and Guimarães should be the next to join to this revolutionary shift in mobility.
In the city of archbishops, it is expected that there will be free transport until 2029. The birthplace, for its part, did not set a deadline, despite having already mentioned its intention.
For now, Cascavel is the only municipality that already has free transport.
Porto should follow in its footsteps, very soon, with the Chamber highlighting that it has been working “to optimize and increase public transport frequencies, comfort and reliability, through investments in fleet renewal and expansion of the bus corridor network”.
According to the municipality tells JN, this measure aims to “leverage a true modal transition process in the Municipality of Porto, with a view to implementing a pioneering public policywhich can enhance a transformation on a metropolitan scale“.
What are the risks of these measures?
In the morning, Miguel Lopesresearcher at the Territory, Transport and Environment Research Center (CITTA), at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto explains that there is a risk of loss of revenue which, “in Portugal, is a significant portion of the financial balance of public transport”.
“In Luxembourg, ticketing revenue represented less than 10% of the budget of the public transport system. In STCP, it is more than 50% of revenue. And in the Porto Metro it is mainly responsible for having more revenue than expenditure”, he says, warning that “money has to come from somewhere”taking into account that the costs will fall on municipal and not national budgets.
The expert also says that with lower revenues, the financial rebalancing should not be achieved through a reduction in costs“which generally means lower quality of service”.
“It’s not enough to be cheap, it has to be quality, have frequency, be reliable, satisfy needs. It’s not worth lowering the price or making it completely free and then not having an offer on the route and time I need”, he says, in turn, to JN, João Figueira de Souzaprofessor at Universidade Nova de Lisboa.
