Medellin City Council OKs COP$5.3 Trillion 2019 Budget; Electric-Bus Fleet to Expand

The Medellin City Council on November 26 voted 19-2 to approve a COP$5.3 trillion (US$1.6 billion) 2019 budget mainly favoring the city’s most vulnerable citizens.

More than 78% of the budget goes to public education, health, infrastructure and “social inclusion,” according to the city’s Treasury Secretary Orlando Uribe Villa.

The budget includes a COP$77 billion (US$23.7 million) addition over the Mayor’s originally submitted budget in order to complete infrastructure projects including a new public hospital in the low-income Buenos Aires neighborhood, the new Alejandro Echavarria public school and the “Buen Comienzo” kindergarten head-start program for poorer children in the Loreto neighborhood.

Medellin leads all major cities in Colombia by funding public education from pre-kindergarten through eleventh grade and then subsidizing college studies for many lower-income children.

Electric-Bus Fleet to Expand

On a related front, Medellin Mayor Federico Gutierrez announced November 20 that the city has asked vendors to submit bids for a contract worth COP$75 billion (US$23 million) for 55 pure-electric transit buses for the “Metroplus” bus rapid transit (BRT) system, which currently employs 77 natural-gas-fueled buses and just one electric bus.

If any bids eventually qualify, then the city could start acquiring these new electric buses by end-2019, according to the Mayor.

The zero-emissions buses would have capacity for 80 passengers, have a 280-kilometers range between recharges, be capable of climbing steep inclines in some of Medellin’s neighborhoods, and be capable of battery recharge in four hours, according to the bid proposal.

Medellín aims to slash air pollution by converting more of its vehicle fleet to zero-emissions electric power. The city currently suffers poor air quality mainly because of grossly excessive emissions from cheap, poor-technology motorcycles along with ancient, obsolete diesel-powered trucks and buses, as well as obsolete, high-emitting cars.

If any of the bus-bids are successful, then Medellin soon will have the largest electric-powered transit fleet in Colombia — and one of the largest in Latin America, Mayor Gutierrez boasted.

The city’s current “Metroplus” BRT system runs through 14.7-kilometers-long circuits on “Line 1” and “Line 2,” from the University of Medellin (Belén neighborhood) through the city center and then onward to Aranjuez neighborhood.

Medellin also has Colombia’s only all-electric “Metro” elevated-train system, tied into its growing, all-electric “Metrocable” aerial tram networks plus the electric “Tranvia” roadway tram system.