Popularity Brupass transport ticket is growing

The Brupass formulas, the joint tickets and season tickets for public transport in and around Brussels created by the transport companies MIVB/STIB, De Lijn, TEC, and NMBS/SNCB to make journeys in and around the capital easier, are attracting increasing numbers of users.

That is according to recent figures from Brussels Minister for Mobility Elke Van den Brandt (Groen), which the newspaper La Dernière Heure was able to consult.

12% increase in monthly subscriptions

The monthly subscriptions rose from 89 199 in 2021 to 108 060 in 2022, and annual subscriptions from 15 701 to 17 701. The evolution is even more striking for the XL formula, the intermodal ticket that allows travelers to need only one ticket to cover a route in Brussels and the wider periphery, including the municipalities of the Flemish periphery.

Sales have roughly doubled, with 27 307 monthly season tickets sold and 2 482 annual season tickets sold by 2022. This should include the 13 361 school Brupass, a stable figure.

Brupass 1-ride ticket currently costs 2,40 euros and an XL ticket 3,20 euros. For the ‘classic’ monthly ticket, 60 euros is charged, and 84 euros for the XL formula.

Extension to Wallonia?

In April, the Parliamentary Committee on Mobility in the Belgian parliament approved a resolution for a combi-ticket allowing travelers unlimited use of buses, trams, and trains of both NMBS/SNCB, De Lijn, MIVB/STIB, and TEC.

Indeed, anyone wanting to travel from Flanders to the Ardennes by public transport today, for example, would most likely have to use a train from the national railway company NMBS/SNCB and a bus from the Walloon public transport company TEC, and possibly also a bus or tram from the Flemish public transport company De Lijn.

The Brupass is, in a sense, the laboratory of this kind of integrated pricing. But an extension to a larger territory, including Walloon Brabant, for instance, does not seem to be on the agenda for the time being. “The extension is being looked at,” says the office of Mobility Minister Georges Gilkinet (Ecolo). “We are moving forward step by step,” reiterating its “desire to extend the offer.”

DÉFI’s Brussels group criticized the lack of extension. For instance, they find it unacceptable that the limit at which the XL pass can be used should no longer be 11,5 km from the Grand-Place but namely 16 km around Brussels. Besides the Brussels stations, the offer would thus expand to 30 stations, including those of Huizingen, Asse, and Zaventem airport, close to the regional border but currently excluded from the offer.