Smaller works are still ongoing on parts of the track. Continue reading
Transport expert and former state secretary Dávid Vitézy shared the news on his Facebook page that the Hungarian capital was the world’s busiest tram network in 2019, 2020, and 2021. Budapest was ahead of Paris, Prague, and Vienna in this respect, according to the statistics of the International Association for Public Transport.
“Budapest is the city of trams, and we should be proud of this and happy that an inherently electric mode of transport has been able to remain so dominant in our country, so that not only a few new electric buses represent the post-diesel era in surface transport, but our public transport system is fundamentally green,” Dávid Vitézy wrote.
He added that Budapest’s tram network had been in decline during the 1980s, with several ideas of closing lines mooted but ultimately not implemented.
From the 2000s onwards, a number of developments followed, including the arrival of the Combino trams around 2004-2006, and a contract with CAF (Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles, a Spanish railway vehicles manufacturing company) in 2014 also gave the network a new impetus.
According to the expert, so many tram lines are currently being built around the world, for example in Paris, that Budapest’s first place is not safe for long. However, there are a number of ready-made plans in the works to continue in Hungary, including the reinstatement of the tram on one of the busiest streets, Thököly Road, or the linking of the rail axis.
It is worth taking these seriously and building them as soon as domestic or EU funding can be secured, because trams have as much future in Budapest as they have past,”
concluded Vitézy.
Photo: Facebook/BP18
Meanwhile, the Mayor of Budapest recently announced that in the framework of the most significant vehicle replacement program,
51 new CAF-type trams will arrive in the capital to run on the Buda lines.
He stressed that the 51 new CAF vehicles will greatly help the further development of public transport in Budapest. He said the aim is to make more and more people feel that tram transport is a real alternative to car transport.
The new vehicles are thanks to the government’s contract with the Spanish company. As Vitézy pointed out in an earlier Facebook post, according to a government decision published in February, the Budapest Transport Center will be able to exercise the last option of the 2014 tram procurement contract, the last of 51 trams, with EU and government funding. This means that 46 standard trams and five 56-meter-long trams will be added to the existing low-floor trams in Budapest.
Featured photo via Facebook/BKK – Budapesti Közlekedési Központ