Transport Minister Guillermo Dietrich confirmed today that minimum fares for buses and trains in the Buenos Aires metropolitan area will increase by 100%.
From 8th April, the minimum bus fare will increase from $3 to $6 while basic train tickets will rise from $2 to $4. In both cases, the tariff will increase in line with the distance travelled.
Subte fares are also set to rise by 67% to $7.5, though this will be implemented in the next two months.
(Infographic via Infobae)
Train fares paid without a SUBE card will cost twice as much (starting at $4), while the bus and subte networks are phasing out travel without a SUBE card.
Dietrich also announced a ‘social tariff’ with a 55% discount for “pensioners, people receiving social benefits, domestic employees, and Malvinas war veterans.” The government estimates that this could benefit up to 6m people.
The transport minister said that the fare increases were necessary after years on being held below market prices, adding that without any state subsidies the bus fare would reach up to $13.5. Dietrich also stated that the government would invest $5bn in the next 15 months to improve the urban public transport system.
However, the announcement today generated criticism from users and unions. “They have this logic of ‘normalising’ the economy for the business owners and leaving behind the demand of workers, said Rubén Sobrero of the Sarmiento Line train workers union. “I knew they would do this because of their ideological leanings, but I never thought it would be quite so brutal.”
“Another ‘mega-hike’ in Mauricio Macri’s austerity plan. Now transport costs are rising and the workers and people are the ones that pay the consequences again,” Tweeted leader of the CTA union Pablo Michetti.
The rise in transport fares comes just two months after a sharp hike in electricity tariffs and with increases in water and gas bills expected to be announced at the start of April.
Yesterday, Cambiemos legislator Elisa Carrió took to Twitter to criticise her coalition partners for the “brutal adjustments” in basic tariffs.
“You can’t drown a society that supports our change. It’s true that we need to end the subsidies but not in this way,” said Carrió, who later had a meeting with President Macri that she described as “tough, frank, and fun.”
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