Aena have been discussing this system with the Aviba association of travel agencies and the CAEB Confederation of Balearic Business Associations, the president of Aviba, Francesc Mulet, saying that "competition at the airport will be healthy". "The aim is to avoid the situation of last year and solve a problem that affected the island's tourism image. Tourists will have more options when it comes to going to their destinations."
The situation of last year to which Mulet is referring was one of a shortage of public transport - buses and taxis. He adds that "the level of saturation" (long queues and delays) experienced last summer at the airport "does not have to be repeated when there is time to adopt appropriate measures". As to opposition from taxi drivers, he says that "it is clear that if they cannot cope, we must give room to more competition and solve all the public transport problems".
It is understood that Aena are to put the service out to tender, private transport operators themselves having been demanding that free competition prevail and that "pirate" transport is prevented. There will be ticket offices in arrivals, but it is unclear - as yet - how this system can be compatible with a Balearic government insistence that sales by private operators must be in advance. This requirement goes to the heart of the problems caused by pirate operators who pick up at the airport without prior bookings.
4 comments
To be able to write a comment, you have to be registered and logged in
Stephen PerrimanOh, so you've never been outside of a resort? Off season bus service everywhere else is largely the same. The schedules to the resorts go rather slim for obvious reasons. Few tourists fancy a 20 sq. meter spartan room overlooking a cold windy beach in winter with everything around them boarded up, so it's a different tourist demographic visiting in winter. They generally don't book resorts. They're more interested in proximity to the things they're coming for; golf, hiking, cycling, sightseeing, shopping, and/or a bit of peace working remotely somewhere more tolerable than freezing northern Europe. And I shouldn't need to mention that people actually *live* here (yes, even outside of Palma and Calvia), and use public transport all year round. Having said that, yes, the taxi/transport cartel needs a rude awakening. Legalising Uber would be a good start. This little gesture towards independent transport helps, but falls pretty short of achieving anything tangible. And really, political parties are primarily interested in self-preservation, so there's no guarantee any of them will be willing to spend political capital on something that could put them out of office. Some of the more extreme left and right are obviously (unwittingly) willing to cut their own throats, but that's just the nature of extremism. Believing too much in what you *want* to believe is never a wise long term political strategy. It always ultimately ends badly (look at the UK for example). Sometimes you need to look at reality (well, ideally, reality should always be the first stop, but it's politics, and in politics, politics always comes first).
About time they stopped running scared of the taxi mafia.
Stephen PerrimanHopefully vox wins.
And keep at least a skeleton service running in the winter. Current bus transfers a complete joke out of season nothing running at all but thankfully car hire is cheap then. Majorca government totally clueless about encouraging out of season independent travellers.Let’s home the reformed PP party wins in May to reverse the decay and decline everywhere in Majorca !