The Lisbon Metro is offering pre-loaded cards with two trips (round trip). All you have to do is fill out a short form, wait for an SMS and then "print" the ticket at a station.
The Lisbon Metro will offer free transportation to all those who go to the Oriente Vaccination Center (FIL) to be vaccinatedThis is done in collaboration with the Lisbon City Council.
The offer consists of a Occasional Navigator (ex-Viva Viagem) loaded with two metro journeys (round trip) and which, according to Metro de Lisboa, will be "personal and non-transferable". All interested parties have to do is fill in a form available on the Metro website (or call the company's customer service number, 213 500 115, which is available from Monday to Friday between 8.30 and 19.00).
Then all interested parties have to do is wait for their application to be validated. Once they have done this, they will receive a 16-digit code by SMS which they can enter at any ticket vending machine inside a metro station, using the "Tem Voucher" option, to receive the pre-loaded card. The voucher will be available for redemption from the date the SMS is sent and for a period of four days.
With free metro rides to the vaccination center, the aim is to promote a more sustainable mobility alternative, in a city that is already too congested and polluted by the increase in car traffic. "This initiative is part of a policy to promote public health and safety that has been implemented by Metropolitano de Lisboa since the beginning of the pandemic"reads a statement from the company. The FIL vaccination center is served by the Oriente station on the Red Line.
At the beginning of December, the Lisbon City Council opened what Carlos Moedas promptly called the "largest vaccination center in the country" in Pavilion 4 of FIL. The vaccination centers that had previously been operating in different parts of the city have been closed, a measure that had already been decided by the previous executive, given the evolution of the pandemic at the time and the lack of any decision regarding a third dose. The owners of the buildings where vaccination centers still operated, such as the University of Lisbon or the Hindu Community, need these spaces, as Moedas explained to journalists at the inauguration of the center at FIL.
However, centralizing vaccination in a location at one end of the city does not match the message that the current Mayor of Lisbon gave during the election campaign, when he promoted the concept of "15-minute city", by Carlos Morenos - a city of proximity where all essential services are no more than 15 minutes away on foot or by bicycle, is not a city that centralizes vaccination services at one end, promoting long-distance travel, even by public transport.
