The Mayor of Braga, Ricardo Rio, confirmed this Tuesday, during an event at the National Palace of Queluz, that construction of the BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) system in the city will begin in the first half of 2025. The total investment will be of 150 million euros.
The mayor reinforced that the Municipality is “strongly committed” to the transition of urban mobility in order to ensure environmental sustainability and contribute to this objective at a national level.
“On the one hand, we have invested a lot in renewing the Braga Urban Transport fleet – with 40% of the fleet using electric vehicles – creating an increasingly attractive offer for the population and being the fastest growing public transport company in Portugal. , there is still a long way to go and with very ambitious objectives to make the transport system even more attractive. It is for this reason that the BRT system emerged which, due to its modernity, reliability, frequency and speed of circulation, will guarantee greater attractiveness, especially in the urban network where it serves the majority of the population”
The various stages of this project include the Preliminary Decision Support Study, in April 2021, the collection of Mobile Network Data, in February 2022, the Demand Study for the Implementation of the BRT, in November 2022, the Traffic at 49 intersections, in December 2022, and the Urban Insertion Study between 2023 and 2024, Ricardo Rio highlighted that the inclusion of the project in the latest review of the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR), made it possible to allocate 100 million euros to the BRT de Braga, a value that corresponds to 66.6% of the project’s budget – in total, 150 million euros -, which will finance the construction of two of the four BRT lines.
“In the initial phase, the network will have the aforementioned two lines and a length of 12.2 kilometers, with plans to later expand to four lines with a total length of 22.5 kilometers,” he explained.
One of the lines will connect the Minho Center to the Railway Station and the other to the University of Minho and the hospital.
Subsequently, the project is expected to expand to two other lines, with a total length of 22.5 kilometers.
As next steps, Ricardo Rio said that “at this moment the competition for the Preliminary Study will be launched, which will be followed by the design and implementation project which will last approximately six months and, subsequently, the entire process will take place of construction”.
Ricardo Rio was speaking on the sidelines of the ‘Jornadas Navegante’, which marked the fifth anniversary of the entry into force of the Passe Navegante.
