Saima’s PR Bus on Italian public transport from North to South
The PR Bus turnstile, also known as Welc’on Bus, was approved by the Geneva Transport Commission and first installed in Venice in October 2013 to align maritime checks with land-based checks. The initial experiment yielded reassuring results, reducing ticketless ticket-free smugglers by 4.35%, a percentage that has continued to decline over time.
The success of the Veneto region has generated a wave of interest, which in turn has led to real financial benefits from the installations. Over the years, public administrations in several major Italian cities have decided to equip themselves with this system to prevent free-riding fraud: Ascoli, Bologna, Trento, Piombino, Ancona, Genoa, Rome, Bari, La Spezia, Turin, Prato, Naples, and most recently, Asti in June 2019.
WHAT ARE THE OPINIONS OF CITIZENS WHO HAVE EXPERIENCED THE BUS TURNSTILE?
In some of these cities, the installation of the PR Bus has been a turning point. In Rome, the innovation of the bus turnstiles was perceived as a move by the transport company, which began to loudly declare a “NO” to tax evasion, so much so that it generated overwhelmingly positive feedback from public transport users who had been waiting for a strong signal.
In Turin, too, after a trial period of the turnstile, during which its functionality was tested even in emergency situations by removing the arms, it was calculated that after the installation of the PR Bus, only 15% of total users were found to be tax evaders. Questionnaires were also administered to users of the lines on which the PR Bus was installed, and the results were highly satisfactory. In Genoa, following the experiment on the subway, and following the activities in Turin and Bologna, citizens themselves requested a corrective action to combat tax evasion.
The simple use of the turnstile by users is a fundamental requirement and has been promoted locally through the most common media outlets, along with awareness campaigns against fare evasion. For example, the public transport company of the city of Piombino has produced an educational and promotional video illustrating the simple steps that users must follow when boarding the bus.
Over the past two years, the number of cities testing the PR Bus turnstile has tripled, a clear sign not only of the increasingly entrenched fight against toll evasion but also of the positive reception it has received from residents.
It is expected that in the next two years, even more cities will adopt the anti-evasion system, thus offering universal service on all lines, as is already the case in many European cities.
