Porto Metro
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Flexity Outlook Eurotram train of the Porto Metro at Trindade station | |
| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Native name | Metro do Porto |
| Owner | Government-owned corporation |
| Locale |
Porto Gondomar Maia Matosinhos Póvoa de Varzim Vila do Conde Vila Nova de Gaia |
| Transit type | Light rail |
| Number of lines | 6 |
| Number of stations | 81 |
| Daily ridership | 152,600 passengers (on average) (2011) |
| Website | Metro do Porto |
| Operation | |
| Began operation | 7 December 2002 |
| Operator(s) | ViaPORTO |
| Number of vehicles | 102 |
| Technical | |
| System length | 67 km (42 mi) |
| Track gauge | 1,435 mm (4 ft 8 1⁄2 in) standard gauge |
| Electrification | 750 V DC OHLE |
The Porto Metro (Portuguese: Metro do Porto), part of the public transport (mass transit) system of Porto, Portugal, is a light rail network that runs underground in central Porto and above ground into the city's suburbs. Metro do Porto S.A. was founded in 1993, and the first line of the system opened in 2002.[1]
The network has 6 lines and reaches seven municipalities within the metropolitan Porto area: Porto, Gondomar, Maia, Matosinhos, Póvoa de Varzim, Vila do Conde and Vila Nova de Gaia. It currently has a total of 81 operational stations across 67 kilometres (42 mi) of double track commercial line. Most of the system is at ground level or elevated, but 8 kilometres (5.0 mi) of the network is underground. The system is run by ViaPORTO.
History
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Line A (blue line) between Senhor de Matosinhos and Trindade in central Porto was the first Porto Metro line to open, in 2002. The line was extended in 2004 to Estádio do Dragão, in time for the Euro 2004 Football championship.
On April 14, 2005, Line B (red line) opened. The Casa da Música concert hall (which has a station on the combined ABCEF line) opened on the same day. Lines A and B are the last legacy of a line which once went from Trindade to Famalicão, originally narrow gauge, opened in 1875, completed in 1881 and switched to metre gauge in 1930. (The stretch from Varzim to Famalicão is now a bicycle trail.)
Line C (green line) opened on July 30, 2005, reaching the centre of Maia. An extension to ISMAI opened in March 2006. Line C uses a stretch formerly part of the Guimarães line which joined the current line at Lousado.
Line D (yellow line) proved the most problematic to excavate and opened in 2005. The line runs from João de Deus and Vila Nova de Gaia in the south before crossing the River Douro and passing through central Porto en route to São João Hospital in the north. The São João Hospital and IPO stations were not brought into service until April 2006 due to safety concerns. In October 2011, it was extended to Santo Ovídio.
Line E (violet line) opened on May 27, 2006, connecting the Airport Francisco Sá Carneiro and Campanhã. Several weeks later, the line was extended until Estádio do Dragão. An end-to-end journey takes 33 minutes, with trains departing every 20 minutes.
Line F (orange line) opened on January 2, 2011, connecting the Porto city centre to the Gondomar region in the east, this line runs between Senhora da Hora and Fânzeres.
Lines A, B, C, E & F follow the same course within the City of Porto (between Estádio do Dragão and Senhora da Hora). The transfer point between Line ABCEF and Line D is at Trindade in central Porto; from Trindade to Senhora da Hora, the right of way recycles the original Porto-Varzim-Famalicão/Maia-Trofa-Guimarães trunk line.
Costs and financial results
As of 2007, the total cost of Porto Metro mass transit public transport system stands on 3,500 million euros - over 1% of Portugal's GDP. The first phase of the project alone, which was led by the mayors of several Grande Porto (Greater Porto) municipalities including Valentim Loureiro as a chairman of the state-owned company, was 140% more expensive than initially planned which means a slippage of over 1,500 million euros. The Porto Metro state-owned company has reported losses every year, reaching a record loss of 122 million euros in 2006.[2][3]
Trains
The Metro uses modern Eurotram low-floor, articulated trams. New Flexity Swift LRVs are used on line B, Bx and occasionally line C since 2008, and can reach 100 km/h (62.5 mph). They also have more seats, and can, in common with most modern light rail systems, recover 30% of the total of consumed energy during braking.
The majority of services run with two LRVs coupled together. The Eurotram consists of four main compartments, two in each carriage linked by short corridors, and also features an articulation between the two carriages. They have a capacity of 80 seated and 134 standing passengers.
Tickets
The system uses the "Andante" ticketing system. Machines in stations issue and can recharge Andante Azul - blue "Occasional" tickets, while Andante Gold is a credit-card style "Gold" tickets (which bear a scanned photograph of the holder) that can be purchased in Lojas Andante (Andante Shops). Tickets can also be topped up at Multibanco ATM terminals.
The Porto Metro operates on a proof-of-payment system. Tickets must be validated before travel by scanning them in front of the yellow machines located in stations. A validated occasional ticket allows for unlimited travel within a specified time period, currently 1 hour for the minimum 2-zone ticket, and longer as the number of valid zones increases. The gold passes allow unlimited travel within a pre-defined area, and are available in "anytime" or cheaper "10/16" (off-peak) versions. There is also a daily ticket, known as Andante 24 that allows the user to make unlimited trips within a given day in the zones chosen. For example, a Z3 (3-zone) ticket is valid for 3 zones in any direction of travel from the first validated zone. So, to cover all of the Metro, except the northernmost part of Line B (zones N2 and N3), a Z4 ticket is needed, provided it is validated in zone C1.
There are no faregates within the Metro; instead, groups of fare inspectors randomly check tickets with hand-held scanners. The current penalty for travelling without a validated ticket is €77.
The metro uses the same zoning system as the majority of public transport providers in the Porto metropolitan area, which is divided into Central (C), North (N) and South (S) zones, and further divided into numbered sub-zones. The C1 zone in central Porto is effectively the area contained within the VCI (Via Cintura Interna) inner ring-road, while zones C2 and C6 are the areas between the VCI and the Estrada da Circunvalação outer ring-road.
The Andante system is being rolled out across the entire Porto public transit network. STCP bus routes and some other bus routes currently accept Andante and the intention is for the entire bus, metro and suburban train network to become integrated. The same ticket can be used on downtown Porto trams and the cable car (Funicular dos Guindais).
Network
| Metro do Porto | |||||
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| Line | Length (km) |
Stations | Inauguration | Vehicle | |
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15,6 | 23 | 7 December 2002 | Flexity Outlook (Eurotram) | |
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33,6 | 35 | 13 March 2005 | Flexity Swift (Tram-train) | |
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19,6 | 24 | 30 July 2005 | Flexity Swift (Tram-train) | |
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9,2 | 16 | 18 September 2005 | Flexity Outlook (Eurotram) | |
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16,7 | 21 | 27 May 2006 | Flexity Outlook (Eurotram) |
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17,4 | 24 | 2 January 2011 | Flexity Outlook (Eurotram) | |
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0,3 | 2 | 19 February 2004 | Funicular of Guindais | |
Line A: Senhor de Matosinhos ↔ Estádio do Dragão (blue)
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_(5760545159).jpg) Line A grass covered track | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Line B/Bx: Póvoa de Varzim ↔ Estádio do Dragão (red)
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 Flexity Swift (Tram-train) on Line B. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Line C: ISMAI ↔ Campanhã (green)
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.jpg) Metro do Porto composition next to the Forum Maia Station.  Aliados Station entrance. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Line D: Santo Ovídio ↔ Hospital São João (yellow)
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 Dom Luis I's bridge crossing by Metro  Trindade Station, Line D platform  IPO Station, Line D | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Line E: Aeroporto ↔ Estádio do Dragão (violet)
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Line F: Senhora da Hora ↔ Fânzeres (orange)
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Funicular dos Guindais
The Metro do Porto company also operates the Funicular of Guindais, a cable-car system that was originally built in 1891 and was recently remodelled. It connects the riverside area of Ribeira to higher ground at Batalha, near the São Bento station.
Future expansion
- Line C: To Paradela, Trofa.
- Line D: Connection to Vila D'Este.
- Line G: Senhor de Matosinhos to São Bento.
- Line H: Matosinhos Praia to Vila D'Este.
- Line I: Campanhã to Gondomar.
See also
- Trams in Porto
- Sociedade de Transportes Colectivos do Porto (STCP)
- Lisbon Metro
- List of tram and light rail transit systems
References
- ↑ Webb, Mary (ed.) (2009). Jane's Urban Transport Systems 2009–2010, p. 277. Coulsdon, Surrey (UK): Jane's Information Group. ISBN 978-0-7106-2903-6.
- ↑ Gestores do Metro do Porto recebem €650 mil de prémios, Expresso newspaper, 18 February 2006, accessed March 2007 (in Portuguese)
- ↑ Metro do Porto fechou exercício com resultado negativo de 122 milhões de euros, Diário Económico website, 7 March 2007, accessed March 2007 (in Portuguese)
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Metro do Porto. |
- Porto Metro Official Homepage
- Official website for the ticketing system
- Map of the Porto Metro network (.pdf file)
- Metro do Porto news archive
- Photos of Metro do Porto's station architecture
- Flickr's Metro do Porto group
- Expansion - 2nd and 3rd phases (portuguese)
- Porto database / photo gallery and Porto tram list at Urban Electric Transit – in various languages, including English.
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