The City Council tests this week a 100% electric bus on the line that connects Murcia with El Palmar

Murcia City Council is developing this week a pilot test with a 100% electric bus on line 26, which connects the city with the district of El Palmar. Starting this Monday, a zero-emission vehicle will travel 200 kilometers for 15 hours a day without interruption.

“Thus, we intend to know in a real way the efficiency and effectiveness of this type of bus in medium distances since it will be similar to the one that will be used in the new collective public transport network of Murcia that will come into operation at the end of 2023”, explained the mayor , Jose Antonio Serrano. “From the Government Team we are showing that we are working hard to improve public transport and mobility in the municipality. Another of our main objectives is to significantly improve sustainability, which is why urban mobility is a key element. We want public transport to be attractive and efficient, thus achieving a true structure for the municipality”, added the first mayor.

This electric bus, with capacity for 82 passengers, two of them with reduced mobility, avoids the emission of around 80 tons of CO2 per year compared to a normal bus and 256 tons of CO2 in equivalent passenger cars. The new collective public transport network will be made up of at least 135 zero-emission vehicles that will travel 7.5 million kilometers each year, with more than 120,000 seats per day.

All these buses will have different technological advances that will allow payment by card, mobile phone and QR code, real-time information and free Wi-Fi for users. Murcia City Council stresses that “the new system will be based on the reorganization and optimization of networks to offer the population an updated service with new technologies and quality, which will be in force for the next few years.”

The new service will have a unified rate throughout the municipality with free transfer. Those who make four trips a day, thus exceeding 80 trips a month, will go from paying the current 1.15 euros to 0.66 euros per ticket. In addition, the network will have 66 lines, 22 more than the current ones. And 98% of the population will be connected by bus to the rest of the municipality since the offer in districts increases significantly.