The past months have been a challenging time for public transport due to Covid-19. Many transit workers lost their lives, ridership plummeted to record levels, and revenues from fare collection dropped massively. Fare evasion might be one a small problem for transit at the moment, but is it one to be completely ignored? Our...
Increased fare evasion rates during the pandemic
Public transport use changes during Covid-19 in Barcelona
Ridership is down by an average 90% in Barcelona and surroundings in the past month
Travelling by public transport in Barcelona is restricted to essential journeys only as the city maintains Covid-19 restrictions. Local transit agencies now use their communication budgets urging people to stay at home. Ridership declined as much as 95% on some days. During the two-week period of total lockdown between March 30 – April 12,...
Fake cards account for 40% of Barcelona’s fare evasion
People travelling without a valid ticket costed the Barcelona operator TMB 9.6 million euros in 2017
Fare evasion in public transport caused a loss of 9.6 million euros to the operator Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona (TMB) in 2017. Almost half of this cost was due to passengers sneaking into the metro with fake cards. According to the estimates of the consortium Autoritat de Transport Metropolità (ATM), around 22,200 trips were...