Zero advocates phased expansion of Lisbon metro to avoid loss of funds

The environmental organization ZERO this Monday asked the government to implement the Lisbon metro expansion project in stages, avoiding the loss of funds from the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR), and to invest in the electrification of public road transport.

In a statement sent to Lusa, ZERO said the government had acknowledged that “there is a very high risk” that the Red Line and Purple Line extensions will not be completed by the end of 2026, putting PRR funds at risk, suggesting that the executive create a “Plan B” and “take advantage of the almost certain impossibility of implementing these projects under the PRR to re-evaluate them.”

The PRR funding includes investments in the Lisbon metro of €400 million to extend the Red Line from São Sebastião to Alcântara and €250 million for the Purple Line, which will connect the Beatriz Ángelo Hospital via Odivelas to Loures, for a total of €650 million.

According to ZERO, the Red Line and Violeta Line projects represent “serious shortcomings” in relation to the current railway and metro network: “In the current Red Line project, the lack of connection with the current Campolide railway station has a permanent negative structural effect of high magnitude, since the capacity of the circular line between Sete Rios and the new Olayas/Chelas station, which cannot be expanded without exorbitant costs and which is already overloaded, will quickly be exhausted.”

“In the case of the Purple Line project, its interaction with the Yellow Line in Odivelas is ineffective because it is carried out outdoors and is time-consuming,” the text says.

In this regard, the document states, “concerned about the possibility that the Portuguese State will lose important funds available for investment in the development of public transport, and taking into account the possibility of correcting serious deficiencies in the initial projects, ZERO proposes that in the Report on Environmental Compliance of the Implementation Project (RECAPE) and taking into account the existing Environmental Impact Statement (DIA), the projects be divided into two phases.”

The first phase, ZERO says, “could ultimately be implemented by the end of 2026, with projects adjusted to ensure better coordination of different modes of public transport.”

Regarding the Purple Line, ZERO proposes that “the implementation project should focus only on the section between Santo António dos Cavaleiros and the current Odivelas metro station, providing a genuine connection with the current Yellow Line, with the aim of eliminating uncovered sections and significantly reducing the transfer time between the two lines compared to the current project.”

It is also proposed to “seriously evaluate” the possibility of implementing the first phase of extending the Red Line only between San Sebastián and Campolide railway station and to include in it the construction of a metro station that would serve the upper part of Campolide and “thus serve the most densely populated residential area of ​​the parish (…), relieving the Belt Line and turning the Red Line into a second railway ring road”.

In the so-called “Plan B”, Zero emphasizes, the PRR “must continue to respect the portion of funds that should be dedicated to combating climate change, with at least 37% of these funds directed towards promoting sustainable mobility.”

“In this sense, ZERO proposes that funds for the construction of lines (…) that remain free be used primarily for the electrification of heavy passenger road transport by, for example, substantially increasing funding for the purchase of electric buses to replace existing diesel vehicles or for their conversion, if possible, as is already the case in a number of EU countries. [União Europeia]”.

Environmentalists say “this measure offers significant environmental benefits as electrification of high-use road vehicles, particularly heavy vehicles, has an extremely high potential to reduce emissions.”