Author | Arantxa HerranzMexico City covers an area that accounts for 0.1% of the country and it has a population of 8,918,653. If we take into account the entire metropolitan area, the figure stands at 21 million inhabitants. Over the last two decades, and given its growth, a series of measures have been implemented, designed to promote the use of public transport instead of private transport to improve air quality. To put this into perspective, it is worth noting that, if in the 1950s the city’s urbanisation rate stood at around 43%, by 2010, it had already reached 78%.The Metro was the dominant form of transport for a long time, measuring around 250 km in length and carrying 4.5 million travellers per day. Traditional transportation systems were generally made up of slow bus services and privately-owned minibuses. The buses were old and highly polluting. These transport deficiencies led to the creation of new motorways; however, in time, it became clear that these measures were causing even more traffic congestion and the project would only serve a small percentage of the city’s inhabitants.On an ordinary working day, over 17.3 million people commute to and from the city. Plus, there are a further 14.7 million trips within the city.Yet, out of these trips, 4.34 million are in cars, while 18.98 million are made using public transport. However, the public transport system is saturated in central areas, while the areas on the outskirts have a very poor public transport system, with long travel times in both directions (it is estimated that each journey can take between two and three hours). To top it all, the public transport system is not particularly cheap for low-income families either. In some cases, people need to allocate one in three dollars to transport
A less polluting form of transport
Road transport is the main cause of CO2 emissions. This is why the authorities decided to implement a series of policies, programs and measures aimed at reducing pollution and improving the public transport network.

Sustainability and accessibility
The city has also committed to an Electric Transport Service. These units cover a total of 203 km, including the last “Zero Emission Bus Corridor –Zero Emission Bike Corridor” inaugurated in 2012. It is also in charge of the city’s electric bike programme.More recent policies, such as the Mobility Law 2014, focus on an integrated, socially-inclusive, resistant and people-focused mobility system. Mexico City’s Strategic Mobility Plan 2019 focuses on redistributing the road space and promotes investments in sustainable methods of transport, with the aim of integrating the different forms of transport in the city, improving infrastructures and services and increasing accessibility and safety for all users.Shared mobility has increased significantly over the last decade in Mexico City. For example, the public bike-sharing system has 480 stations and 6,800 bikes. Since its launch in February 2010, the system recorded more than 58.5 million journeys and has prevented the emission of 4,541 tonnes of CO2.