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The mayor of Almería, Ramón Fernández-Pacheco, and the councilor of the Area of ​​Mobility and Security, María del Mar García Lorca, getting on one of the buses.

It is now possible to pay for the urban bus ticket, a service that Alsa-Surbus provides in the city of Almería, with a credit card via mobile phone or with a contactless credit or debit card. Almería has thus entered a select and reduced list of cities that include London or Shanghai and, in the implementation phase, Madrid or Valencia. This novelty has become effective from today, within the framework of the celebration of the European Mobility Week, in ten buses of the Alsa-Surbus fleet. Specifically on buses attached to lines 5, 8 and 18, that is, those that connect with the Torrecárdenas Shopping Center and the University of Almería.

The mayor, Ramón Fernández-Pacheco, has assured that “one of our priorities is innovation. I want my city to be an example of innovation, of modernity, that we can offer the people of Almeria new, different things and today I am lucky enough to present one of the latest developments incorporated into the urban public transport of the city of Almería. Giving facilities to users, modernizing the service, making it more accessible, comfortable and efficient is a further step in this Government Team's commitment to sustainable urban mobility”.

After this first step, it will be implemented progressively in different phases. The second phase will mean that payment will be effective throughout the Surbus fleet at the end of October. Before the end of the year, the payment will cover all active tariff policies such as round trip tickets or vouchers. Finally, mobile payment will be extended to all groups that enjoy special rates and specific transport cards that require the identification of the beneficiary. This will be in 2020 since it requires the replacement of current cards.

In a presentation ceremony, in which he was accompanied by the CEO of Alsa, Francisco Iglesias, the Councilor for Mobility and Security, María del Mar García Lorca, the director of the Mediterranean Zonal Unit, Valeriano Díaz, and the director of the Metropolitan Transport Consortium of the Almería Area, Luis Miguel Carmona, the mayor recalled his constant commitment to the use of public transport. “In recent times we have launched free transfers, free Wi-Fi in buses, technological improvements both on the website and with an APP, we have implemented new lines and we are facing a constant renewal of the fleet in service that involves the incorporation of 38 new buses in five years,” he said.

Fernández-Pacheco has indicated that “initiatives such as the one we are presenting today are an incentive for new users who, until now, have been using other means of transport, especially private vehicles. Together, we contribute to improving the structure of the city in terms of social and urban mobility, we gain comfort for users with new services adapted to the new times, and also savings for the pocket by facilitating, for example, free transfers”.

For his part, the CEO of Alsa, Francisco Iglesias, has highly valued "the example of public and private collaboration that we have been maintaining with the Almería City Council, always seeking the well-being of the final client, who are the citizens themselves." Iglesias considered that “this is an important milestone that will be valued over time, because it changes the way we understand transport, makes it more comfortable and it has been shown that it increases the number of users.”

Precisely, that growth is what leads Alsa "to bet on Almería. The number of users does not stop growing and that is because there is good planning and good execution by that collaboration between the company and the City Council. For this reason, to the renewal of the fleet in recent years we are going to add another 20 buses in the coming months, so Almería can boast of having one of the most modern fleets in the entire country,” he concluded.

The presentation of the launch of this new convenience for urban bus users is part of the activities that the Security and Mobility Area of ​​the Almería City Council has been carrying out these days on the occasion of the European Mobility Week. Within that program, and in collaboration with Alsa-Surbus, the buses will be free throughout the weekend, on September 21 and 22.