City counsels talk about it endlessly: How to get residents to stop driving and take public transit. From buses to metros and even city-run bike-sharing programs, the main problem always seems to be that not enough people use them; or rather too many people still drive their cars in busy downtown cores.
Well, the European city of Murcia, Spain has found an ingenious plan to get their citizens to make the switch to public transit, permanently. Beginning this year, Murcia implemented a program, “Bono Vitalcio Tranvía,” whereby citizens would give up their vehicles for a lifetime of free public transit use.
That's right; donate your car to the city's program and you get a pass that lets you take the city's trolley for free for the rest of your life.
Creative marketing campaigns were also put in place to drive the point home such as cars parked on top of other cars (to demonstrate the difficulty of finding parking in Murcia's downtown core) as well as a large display of all the cars donated that were slowly disassembled over time.
While not everyone lives close enough to public transit systems to make such a program work, the idea is rather intelligent and just radical enough to garner attention and get other cities thinking along the same lines. It's all about incentives, right?
Source: Shareable
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| Photo: Shareable |
Well, the European city of Murcia, Spain has found an ingenious plan to get their citizens to make the switch to public transit, permanently. Beginning this year, Murcia implemented a program, “Bono Vitalcio Tranvía,” whereby citizens would give up their vehicles for a lifetime of free public transit use.
That's right; donate your car to the city's program and you get a pass that lets you take the city's trolley for free for the rest of your life.
Creative marketing campaigns were also put in place to drive the point home such as cars parked on top of other cars (to demonstrate the difficulty of finding parking in Murcia's downtown core) as well as a large display of all the cars donated that were slowly disassembled over time.
While not everyone lives close enough to public transit systems to make such a program work, the idea is rather intelligent and just radical enough to garner attention and get other cities thinking along the same lines. It's all about incentives, right?
Source: Shareable