Monbus will incorporate two new buses to the Expres.cat net in order improve the transport service between Igualada and Barcelona
Meeting the requirements of the users, the Expres.cat net has been strengthened by means of the incorporation of new direct services in the intercity bus line Igualada - Barcelona (e5) since last 3rd June. Two new vehicles have been purchased which will operate from Monday to Friday.
In this way, it aims to improve the service frequency at rush hours and to reduce the travel time in the corridor with the highest average occupancy in Catalonia. The new direct bus service Igualada - Barcelona (e5) increases the service frequency at rush hours (twenty minutes between each expedition) and reduces by up to forty minutes the route time with respect to the conventional service, so the total route time reaches the fifty minutes without stops and under normal traffic flow.
With this measure, twelve direct expeditions without stops have been added (six to Barcelona and six to Igualada), which added to the eight existing (six to Barcelona and two to Igualada), make a total of twenty direct daily expeditions. In addition to all this, there are ninety-two conventional, daily line services, from which, twenty-two have a stop in the town of Capellades. Altogether, one hundred and eleven expeditions between both cities and three direct reinforcements to the city of Barcelona, all of them with daily frequency.
By means of this measure, it is aimed to improve the quality of the service in a framework, in which to reach all the users’ expectations is really complicated. This is due to the unequal travellers’ concentration in this corridor at different moments of the day, marked by high fluctuations among rush hours and off-peak hours. Up to eight hundred additional travellers will be able to travel at rush hours, which allows reach approximately nine thousand daily seats available between both cities.
Those people using this means of transport for reasons of work or studies every day, make a very positive assessment of the increasing of direct services since this implies they have more time for their daily tasks.
The Expres.cat net intends to improve the signalling and information of the bus stops and to start up a second phase, from 2014 onward, in which new buses will probably be incorporated.