This Country Makes Public Transport Free For All Citizens; Will Spend Rs 4000 Crore Annually On Free Transport!

One of Europe’s smallest countries, Luxembourg, will now be offering public transportation absolutely free of charge! This makes the country the first ever in the world to offer free of cost public transportation. 

This includes all transportation, including trains, trams, and buses. The government has cited road congestion and pollution as reasons behind this revolutionary step. Also, helping out the low earners is one of the reasons behind this.

Find out more details right here!

Luxembourg To Make All Public Transport Free Of Cost

The country itself has a population of more than 600,000 people, but 214,000 or more come in on a daily basis from the neighbouring countries such as Germany, Belgium, and France. Of this, a majority of them commute by cars, which is the primary reason behind the heavy congestion on the roads of Luxembourg. As per reports, more than half of the greenhouse gas emissions in Luxembourg are caused by the cars running on its roads.

To see this plan through, the country is planning to invest as much as 3.9 billion euros in railways from 2018-28. Also, there are plans to upgrade the bus networks, and add to the park-and-ride sites on the borders of the country. 

Why is Luxembourg Promoting Public Transportation?

This step has also been taken to support the low wage earners in the country. Transport minister Francois Bausch said, “For people with low incomes or the minimum wage, for them it’s really substantial. The main reason is to have a better quality of mobility, and then the side reason is clearly also environmental issues.” He also revealed that the Government wants to be a laboratory for mobility while identifying the rise in population in the country which is about 40% in 20 years. 

With this project, the Government of Luxembourg is aiming to get 20% more passengers to use public transport and make them aware of the grave pollution issues existing in their countries. 

However, the Government of luxembourg is hoping that this move will get the number of people commuting via cars to come down to 65% by 2025, which was 73% in 2017.

Given the condition of traffic congestion and the rush on the roads in India, here’s to hoping that the Indian government takes some steps towards making public transportation atleast cheaper, if not free! Do you agree? Let us know in the comments section below!

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