Porto Has Issued 100,000 Free Transport Cards Against a Model That Assumed 59,381 Users
Pedro Duarte gave the figure eight weeks after the scheme began. About 50,000 of the cardholders already held an Andante pass, which puts the genuinely new riders below the projection the Camara took to deputies in May with a 20.5 million euro annual cost.
Porto's mayor said on Friday that the city has handed out more than 100,000 Cartão Porto municipal cards carrying free travel, eight weeks after the scheme began. When the Assembleia Municipal do Porto (Porto Municipal Assembly) approved the measure in May, the Câmara's own modelling put expected take-up at 59,381 users.
Pedro Duarte gave the figure to journalists after riding the number 22 tram between Carmo and Batalha, a line that only returned to service on 1 August. "We have today more than 100,000 Cartão Porto cards already distributed," he said, "and that fills us with pride, but also with responsibility, because now public transport has to answer what the city has been signalling to us in the Câmara Municipal."
Half of them already rode
The number that shapes the story came in the mayor's next sentence. Of the 100,000 people now travelling free in Porto, around 50,000 already held an Andante pass. The other 50,000 are new sign-ups to the card.
That split matters in two directions. The genuinely new users, the people who were not on the network before, come in below the 59,381 the Câmara projected. And the scheme is carrying roughly 50,000 riders who were previously paying, which is what a universal free tariff does by design: it converts existing fare revenue into a municipal subsidy before it converts a single driver.
The curve has been steep. Five days after the 10 July start the council counted 30,000 sign-ups. Eight weeks on the count has more than tripled, and against an eligible population the Câmara put at 252,687 residents, roughly two in five now hold the card.
What the assembly voted for
The scheme passed on 4 May with PS, the governing PSD/CDS-PP/IL coalition, BE and Livre in favour and Chega against. The run-rate cost is 20.5 million euros a year, with commitment ceilings of 10.25 million for 2026 and 18.7 million for 2027. The legal start was fixed at 1 January 2027; Duarte pulled it forward to July, as he had signalled he would.
The entitlement travels further than the city. A cardholder rides the whole Área Metropolitana do Porto: STCP and Unir buses, the tram, the six Metro do Porto lines, suburban trains and the river boat. STCP alone carried 71.8 million passengers last year.
The mayor is managing expectations
Asked about the pressure the measure puts on neighbouring municipalities that cannot match Porto's finances, Duarte said he understands it is "often not agreeable and not easy to manage" politically, and that he wants the whole metropolitan area to adopt something similar one day. On whether free travel will take cars off the road he was notably cautious: "I am not expecting a large modal transfer in the short term. It is good that we put expectations in the right place." The change, he argued, will be visible "within four, five, six years". The May proposal had assumed a 23.5 percent modal share. Nobody in the Câmara is claiming that yet.
What this means if you live in Porto
- The gate is your fiscal address. Free travel goes to people whose morada fiscal is registered in Porto and who hold the Cartão Porto. Residents whose tax address is still elsewhere do not qualify, which catches a lot of newcomers.
- Students are a carve-out. Students living in Porto can request the card even if their fiscal address is in another municipality.
- Apply online. The counter queues were long enough in July for the council to say so publicly, and STCP now answers service questions on WhatsApp.
- It is not a national pass. Outside the AMP you still need a ticket. Our guide to Portuguese transport passes covers the rest, including the 20-euro rail pass that reaches Lisbon and Porto commuter trains this month.
The number to watch is not the card count, which will keep rising because the card costs nothing to hold. It is boardings. Porto committed 20.5 million euros a year against a modelled 59,381 users, has issued cards to nearly twice that many, and half of them were already on the network. Whether the other half rides often enough to justify the budget line is a question the 2027 accounts will answer, not this week's queue at the counter.
