Guide for Barcelona Part 3: Transportation System

Barcelona has a good developed system of public transportation. The most important means of transportation is the metro. Normally you can use it from 5 a.m. to 24 p.m, until 2 a.m. on fridays and saturdays and on days of public holidays it is working the whole night! It is the fastest option to travel and you can reach nearly every part of Barcelona with the metro. They are different tickets you can use depending on how long you will stay and how much you want to use public transportation. In general you can buy the tickets in every metro station and with your metro ticket you can also use the bus and train lines. But there are some things you have to consider before buying a ticket.

For students, who will stay one semester or more, I can recommend the travel card T-Jove which costs 115,00 € for one zone and is valid for 90 days from the first validation. A monthly ticket T-Mes costs 49,30 € and is also a good choice for students, who do want to risk to loose there tickets and loose more than 100 €. For those who do not want to travel so much with the metro because they are using bike or a vespa, I can recommend the T-50/30 ticket. It means that you can travel 50 times during one month, which was totally sufficient for me the first month. For visitors, who would like to stay not longer than a weekend, you might consider to buy the T-10 ticket, with which you have ten journeys and which is absolutely sufficient to discover the city and costs 7,95 €.

With all those mentioned tickets you can also use the bus and train lines in the first zone. For those who like to use the bus instead the metro: there is an overview about all the buslines and timetables on every busstation! But be careful! Buses are often very crowded and moreover they are not always arriving on the expected time! So consider this, when you want to use the bus! Moreover, during the day they need much more time to get to the next station because of all the traffic and the traffic lights! But during the night, the Nit-buses are often the only way to get home after you drank or eat something in a bar or visited a friend! The number of the night bus and it's stations is marked on every busstation with the colour blue. Nearly all the night buses come together at the Plaza Catalunya from where you can change the night bus to get to your home.

But whatever way of public transportation you prefer, take care of your stuff! The public transportation system is one of the most dangerous locations to loose your belongings, although there is the police controlling the services. So watch your bags!

For more information you should visit the website of the TMB of Barcelona: http://www.tmb.cat/ which includes all the information about tickets, timetables, lines and also alterations.