Travel cheaply and ecologically

Car-sharing systems are the motto of this year’s European Mobility Week, which ends this Friday, and have become a growing trend in Portugal and abroad. It is an economical, environmentally friendly and simple way to travel, whether for daily trips, weekend getaways or to discover new destinations on your next vacation. This time, we bring you three projects that have recently been launched in Lisbon involving bicycles, cars and scooters, as well as some other examples to travel around Europe.

We start with EMEL’s new shared public bicycle system, which officially began operating on Tuesday after a testing phase. At the moment, the company has 100 bikes distributed across 10 stations in the Parque das Nações. But the goal is to grow gradually until 1,410 bikes are available at 140 stations planned in different areas of the city. The temporary name “Lisbon Bike Share” is replaced by Gira – Bicicletas de Lisboa. This has led to a change in the branding of the mobile app, available for Android and iOS. It is available through app Everything can be done on the new bike network in Lisbon – create a new user, search for the nearest dock with available bikes, unlock to start riding, and finally rate the experience and pay (three passes: daily, monthly and yearly, from 10 to 25 euros). Similar bike-sharing systems exist in other Portuguese cities (such as BiCas in Cascais and Bugas in Aveiro) and around the world (at oobrien.com/bikesharemap you can find the location of thousands of bike-related stations – more than 100 city sharing systems).

Let’s continue with two-wheelers, but now with electric motorcycles, and talk about eCooltra, a sharing company Scooters The product was first launched in Barcelona and arrived in Lisbon in April this year (it is also available in Madrid and Rome). The scooter rental service has 170 vehicles per minute across the Portuguese capital. The usage is the same, through app The only difference is that there are no docks (you can park anywhere authorized, as long as it’s within the company’s territory) and no passes (you’re charged by the minute, charged to a pre-notified card, like, for example, an Uber trip).

The same is true for the cars of DriveNow, the company owned by BMW and Sixt that has just arrived in Portugal via Brisa. The international fleet has 5,700 vehicles and operates in several European cities. Currently only available in Lisbon, registration costs 10 euros from the 12th (with 30 minutes of free use). Then, for each journey you will pay a fixed price per minute (depending on the car chosen). The price includes fuel and parking. Currently, a total of 211 vehicles are available, initially available in an area of ​​48 square kilometers, but this is expected to continue to grow. Portuguese competitor Citydrive, founded in 2014, has also updated its app This year, the first arrival in Porto is expected this month.