About thirty workers again prevented the exit of line 5A from Plaza Circular in the direction of Altorreal and La Alcayna
It happened last Friday in an improvised way and was repeated this Thursday, but already well organized and with the permission of the Government Delegation. Some thirty workers blocked the exit of bus line 5A (La Alcayna-Altorreal-Murcia University-Murcia center) from the early hours of the morning and for a couple of hours at the Plaza Circular stop. A service that depends on the Autonomous Community and is covered by the Interbus company.
“We just want to work, but with these new schedules and routes, everything has become very complicated,” explained Liliana and Pepa, two spokespersons for this group who assured yesterday that they will not stop until they hear them. In fact, they explained that today Friday morning they have “finally” an interview with representatives of the Ministry of Development, on which the service depends.
“We want line 52 to return, as it was before,” they pointed out, and regretted that the current route gives them “a lot of turns, we even go through the University, and they take much longer.” “It is a disaster and they have not taken our needs into account at all; We do not know who or where they have chosen these routes, “added the workers.
“If we continue like this, we are going to lose our jobs,” they commented, hoping that the Ministry will end up changing routes and frequencies. “There is a lot of despair because we are a forgotten group,” they concluded. And they were hopeful that their demands will be heard at today’s meeting and that there will be changes.
Travelers on the old lines 49 and 52, which linked Murcia with the La Alcayna and Altorreal urbanizations, and which have been unified on line 5A of the Molina de Segura concession, have missed a frequency in the morning and have passed from having two, at 7 and 8 in the morning, to only one at 8.30.
The group of employees meets this morning with representatives of the Ministry to extend their hours
But it’s not the only case. It is enough to enter social networks to navigate in a generalized ‘thread’ of complaints, both for the “worst” and shortened schedules, as for the general lack of information, and for the reduction in the size of the buses, which causes that, at peak times, many users stay on the ground. Drivers are the first to suffer the consequences of neighborhood unrest, collecting the anger of citizens.
There are also criticisms because the same transport voucher cannot be used if the user makes a transfer to go, for example, from Alcantarilla to Molina de Segura. Each of the three service concessionaires in the Murcia metropolitan area (Interbus, Alsa and Orbitalia) have their own bonds.
Another of the insistent protests that reach the Platform for the Defense of Public Transport comes from the university students who, in the municipality of Murcia, have lost the voucher they used until last Friday (they do not pay it and the district buses do not admit it ).
Users also complain that before they only paid 1.05 euros to get on any bus to make a purely urban journey in Murcia and now, if the bus is from districts, they must pay 1.85 euros. From the Sucina district, users demand more frequencies. In general, there is a feeling “of chaos” and that “we always suffer the same.”
Waiting for a meeting
The mayor of Murcia, José Antonio Serrano, said that although the greatest problems were occurring on the lines that depend on the Community, “morally” they felt obliged to seek a joint solution with the regional administration. “We are waiting to have a meeting” with the Ministry of Development “and when they call us, we will be there,” he said.
In Development they insisted that the incidents “are those of the start of a renewed regional mobility system”, with lines that did not exist before, and to which “specific adjustments must be made”, after verifying its operation “with real traffic”.
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