News from the Cities
New contract for local and regional railways in Rhine-Ruhr
VRR, the public transport authority of the Rhine-Ruhr conurbation (7.2 million inhabitants on a 5,000km2 territory in Germany around Düsseldorf and Essen), signed in July a new contract with DB German railways for the operation of local and regional railway services. The 15-year contract reaches a total value of €6 billion. According to the contract,
Successful fare integration implemented in Seville
Greater Seville includes 22 municipalities for a total population of 1.2 million inhabitants. Achieving greater fare integration between the 10 companies operating transport networks on its 1,300km2 territory has been a major objective of the Consorcio de Transportes del Area de Sevilla, the metropolitan transport authority since it was set up in March 2001. On
Towards more integrated and more reliable rail services in London ?
Heavy rail carries 42% of morning peak passengers into central London; it is a backbone of the public transport systems of the British capital city. Surveys show that Londoners make seven times more rail journeys than people in other UK cities, and that one third of all rail journeys in the country are made wholly
Bike+Ride and integrated information in Rhine-Ruhr
VRR, the public transport authority of the German Rhine-Ruhr conurbation (7.2m inhab. on a 5,000 km2 territory), incites passengers of public transport to use bicycle to go to stations. More than 8,000 bicycles can be parked close to stations, and the number is growing very fast. A list of these Bike and Ride facilities can
Stockholm will try congestion charging during one year
The municipality of Stockholm adopted a proposal to introduce a congestion charging scheme covering the complete inner-town of the city for a 13- month trial period starting in June 2005. During this period, all car drivers entering or leaving the area between 6.30am and 6.30pm will have to pay a charge of SEK 2 (€2.2)
20 years of successful transport and fare integration in the region of Vienna
VOR, the public transport authority for the region of Vienna-Eastern Austria (2.6m inhab. on 8,400 km2) will celebrate in June its 20th birthday. The first steps towards fare integration took place in 1961 with an agreement between Austrian national railways ÖBB and Wiener Linien, the public operator of urban transport systems in Vienna. This was
Tramways are back in Barcelona
34 years after the closure of the last tramway line serving the Catalan capital city, four lines of the new tramway network of Barcelona (see EMTA News n°2) were inaugurated in April and May. This network consists in two separate infrastructures: Trambaix, connecting Barcelona with Southern suburbs, and Trambesos, connecting Barcelona with Northen suburbs. Trambaix,
Fare integration leads to increased patronage in Barcelona
Since the beginning of the implementation of fare integration in the metropolitan area of Barcelona (4.5m inhab) in 2001 by ATM, the public transport authority, passenger traffic has grown by 17.4%. In 2003 alone, 30 million additional passengers used public transport, that is to say an increase by 3.7% vs 2002. The strongest increase occurred
Introduction of electronic ticketing in Bilbao
BARIK (meaning « without » in Basque language), as is called the new electronic ticketing project for the metropolitan area of Bilbao (1m inhab.), was launched in February in the context of a pilot scheme. 4 metro stations, and 3 bus lines are used for this experiment that aims to check during 6 months that
Loans granted by the European Investment Bank to support public transport development in Brussels, Dublin, and Stockhom
The European Investment Bank announced over the past months that it will grant loans to support the development of public transport systems in the following cities : – Brussels: a long-term loan of €250 million has been granted to STIB, the public transport company of the Belgian capital city, so as to modernise tramway infrastructures
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