Alcudia Town Hall had suggested that the first electric carriage replacement for a horse-drawn carriage would have been on the roads before the end of the 2024 season. This didn't materialise, but it is now expected that there will be electric carriages for the 2025 season. In this regard, Alcudia will be a pioneer in Mallorca and the Balearics, despite Palma having in 2022 been identified by the Spanish Government as a pilot city for electric carriages.
At Tuesday's council meeting, councillor Azahara Machado said that the model of electric carriages to be used in Alcudia has been approved by the Spanish Government and is now waiting to pass the Technical Inspection of Vehicles (ITV). "Palma and Muro are waiting to see how the change goes in Alcudia to do it themselves. The company in Valencia that builds them will premiere its model in Alcudia."
Machado explained that eight of the ten carriage drivers have ordered electric vehicles. Municipal regulations approved in the spring of 2024 allow the introduction of electric carriages and the continued use of horse-drawn carriages. The two types can "coexist"; for the time being anyway. The change to electric carriages involves a minimum investment of around 10,000 euros. They can start operating as soon as all the necessary state authorisations are given.
Councillor Agüi Lobo of opposition party PSOE drew attention to a possible problem, one that has arisen in Malaga, which was a pioneer in introducing electric carriages. "Some carriage drivers are backing off because of a lack of reliability and the short life of the batteries." The town hall intends to ensure that there will be charging points in strategic places along the routes the carriages normally take.
Spain's ministry of transport approved these vehicles in 2023. Since then, factories such as Beer Bike Spain in Xàtiva (Valencia), which was visited by a delegation from Alcudia, has begun production of carriages. In Europe, Brussels took the lead in replacing horse-drawn carriages with electric models last summer.
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It would be a great step forward for animal welfare if all horse drawn carriages could be replaced by electric ones. Every time Ii come to Mallorca it sickens me to see the poor horses struggling often in extreme heat and with no rest, it really makes me avoid Palma as I find it so upsetting. Is there a way for the government to subsidise the changeover to encourage horse carriage owners to swop over to electric or a way to fund a loan to them that could be paid back over a few years? This has the possibility of making the change swift and complete and saving further suffering.