The 25 de Abril Bridge railroad crossing, inaugurated 25 years ago, has transported 498 million passengers and removed 80 million cars from the roadway between Lisbon and Almada, the concessionaire’s management told Lusa.
The rail link was inaugurated at the end of the morning on Thursday, July 29, 1999, in the presence of the then Prime Minister, António Guterres, the Minister of Equipment, João Cravinho, the Secretary of State for Transport, Guilhermino Rodrigues, and the mayors of Lisbon, João Soares, Seixal, Alfredo Monteiro, and Almada, Maria Emília Sousa.
Two and a half decades later, the management of Fertagus, the concessionaire for the rail service between the stations of Roma-Areeiro (Lisbon) and Setúbal (54 kilometers), is making a “very positive” assessment, highlighting the impact on mobility and the environment.
“We believe that Fertagus has become essential for mobility in the Lisbon Metropolitan Area and has made a fundamental contribution to improving it. With a high quality, fast and punctual service, we have managed to guarantee the rail link between the South Bank and Lisbon,” Clara Esquível, Fertagus administrator, told the Lusa news agency.
In 25 years of operation, the 25 de Abril Bridge rail service has transported 498 million passengers, equivalent to the population of the entire European Union, and has covered around 51 million kilometers, corresponding to 1,273 laps of the planet.
“We estimate that we have removed around 80 million cars from the 25 de Abril Bridge, which is also very significant and an important contribution,” he said, considering that these figures mean that over 900,000 tons of CO2 have been avoided in the last 25 years.
In 2023, Fertagus transported around 27 million passengers and in the first quarter of this year alone 14.8 million were already counted.
“We’ve always worked with the same rolling stock and we’ve strived for the reality of the service, namely this punctuality and regularity in carrying out the service,” said Clara Esquível.
To mark the 25th anniversary of the railway crossing over the 25 de Abril Bridge, the concessionaire will be carrying out a number of initiatives, including the distribution of gifts alluding to the anniversary at the stations and the christening of a train named after the poet Sebastião da Gama, a native of the Setúbal district.
There will also be a musical performance at Coina station by the guitar quartet Orquestra Nova de Guitarras.
The concession period for the Tagus railway crossing to Fertagus ends on September 30, 2024.
The railway crossing over the Tagus in Lisbon was an old idea: when the bridge was built in 1966, during the time of Oliveira Salazar, a 600-meter tunnel was also built under Praça da Portagem, on the “other side” (extended by another 300 meters in 1999), which was waiting for trains for 33 years.
The total value of the work at the time was around 150 million escudos (around 750 million euros), of which 50 million (250 million euros) was for the structural reinforcement of the bridge, the creation of the sixth track on the road deck, painting and lighting, 77 million (385 million euros) for the infrastructure and 22 million (110 million euros) for the purchase of rolling stock.
