Pablo Arranz
Next Tuesday, July 1, the new fare schedule for the urban public transportation of Coruña will come into effect, which the City Council will update with new measures that include, for example, extending the service’s free access to individuals under 14, one year more than the previously established age range.
This morning, Mayor Inés Rey announced the planned updates, crucial to comply with the latest Royal Decree-Law issued by the Government in this matter, allowing the City Council to benefit from state aid and co-finance trips for users with the Millennium card.
Rey recalled that since January 2023, the City Council and the State Government have subsidized the urban public transportation of Coruña with fares reduced to half their cost. Since then, the State covered 30% of this subsidy, while the City Council assumed 20%, «as the Galician Government ruled out contributing to the promotion of urban public transportation in Coruña.»
Now, with the new system of aids to urban collective transportation established by the Royal Decree-Law, there are slight variations in the conditions previously in place for opting for fare co-financing in the upcoming semester: the Government will cover 20% of the ticket discounts paid with the Millennium card, and the City Council will be responsible for the remaining subsidy. «This means that urban public transportation in Coruña will continue with reduced fares starting July 1 and, at least, until the end of the year,» Rey announced.
Both the social and university fares will continue to be subsidized at 50%
In addition to extending the service’s free access to individuals under 14 years old, the City Council will make an additional economic effort regarding the social and university fares, increasing its contribution from 20% to 30% to ensure users of these fares that the cost reduction of the ticket will remain at 50%. Therefore, the social and university fares will remain frozen at 0.12 and 0.15 euros per ticket.
The Mayor, accompanied this morning by the Councilor for Infrastructure and Mobility, Noemí Díaz, emphasized that the City Council is sensitive to the profile of users of these fares: «We are talking about pensioners, unemployed individuals, people with disabilities, and also students. That’s why we have decided to cover the difference with our own funds so that they can continue using the current fares.»
Regarding the general fare, it will have a 40% discount: the State will cover 20%, and the City Council the remaining 20%.
Therefore, in the upcoming semester, specifically between July 1 and December 31, the fare schedule for users with the Millennium card will be as follows:
- General fare: 0.45 euros.
- University fare: 0.15 euros
- Social fare: 0.12 euros
In Coruña, the current fare for urban buses is 1.30 euros. The City Council was already subsidizing trips before the application of state discounts, as the price per trip was set at 0.75 euros in the general fare when paying with the Millennium card before the pandemic. Starting July 1, users of the bus paying the general fare will pay 30 cents less per trip than they did in 2019. Rey recalled that public transportation subsidies are one of the main investments of the City Council, which allocated over 20 million euros to this purpose last year.
In 2024, record number of trips in the service
This morning, Inés Rey reiterated the importance of promoting shared public transportation as a way to reduce trips in private vehicles. «This council will maintain its commitment to the environment and sustainable mobility policies, which precisely include shared public transportation as an alternative,» she emphasized.
In this sense, data on the annual balance of trips in urban public transportation shows a constant increase that surpasses pre-pandemic figures. In 2019, there were 23 million trips, and even in the context of health restrictions, in 2022, 20 million trips. In 2023, with current aids, trips increased to 24.8 million and reached 27.5 million in the last year.
