The European Union (EU) must make train travel more accessible than plane flights, as part of the fight against climate change, defends today the environmental non-governmental organization (NGO) Greenpeace.
According to a study released today by Greenpeace, long-haul journeys by train are, on average, twice as expensive as those by plane, with some routes costing up to 30 times more than a ticket on a low-cost airline.
The NGO denounces that the railways are being “undermined” by favorable competition conditions for airlines and presents proposals to make rail transport more attractive, “at a time when Europe is facing heat waves and forest fires and air traffic struggles with massive delays and cancellations”.
On the majority (79 out of 112) of the routes analyzed by Greenpeace in the EU, flights are cheaper than trains, with rail travel being twice as expensive on average as air travel, with the overall climate impact of flight can be more than 80 times worse than the train.
Of the 23 that are cheapest, only half have good connections, with the rest having poor or slow train connections.
The issuance of “climate tickets” – transport tickets valid on all means of public transport in a country or a defined region, including cross-border travel –, together with the gradual elimination of subsidies to airlines and airports, are solutions envisaged by Greenpeace , not only for consumers to change the plane, but also the car, for the train, a much less polluting way of traveling.
The reduction or exemption of VAT on train tickets is another proposal from the NGO, as well as the creation of fares for families and social fares for low-income passengers.
Aviation, according to the report, is one of the most harmful sectors for the climate and most unfair in the world, since it affects the entire planet, despite involving only 1% of the world’s population, being still the fastest growing, as a source of emissions. of greenhouse gases between transport.
Greenpeace analyzed train and air connections in 24 Member States, including Portugal, as well as in Norway, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
