Fuengirola's free urban bus service boosts public transport use
The number of bus passengers has almost tripled since the service was launched in May 2023
The decision by Fuengirola town hall to make the local bus service free for registered residents, which came into effect on 17 May 2023, has boosted the use of this mode of transport to almost triple the number of passengers. Before the service became free for residents, the use of the urban bus was around 1 million passengers per year, some 2,740 per day, but in 2024, the figure rose to 2,727,806 users, or 7,473 per day, according to the figures provided by Fuengirola council. The latest figure, however, is slightly lower than that registered in 2023, when it exceeded 3 million journeys.
Not only locals residents use urban bus transport. Of every 100 journeys made, 31 are made by non-residents who have neither the Tarjeta Ciudadana nor the mobile application that allows registered residents to use the service free of charge. More than 855,000 journeys were made last year with payment, either using cash or bank card.
Line 1, which links the Miramar shopping centre with Carvajal, is by far the most used. Of the 2.72 million passengers last year, 1.79 million were on this line, almost 66 per cent of the total. The least used is line 4, which runs from Los Pacos to Los Boliches, with just over 200,000 passengers per year, while the other three lines have around 240,000 passengers.
