According to a statement sent to Lusa, the transport company will now "monitor the parking of vehicles in bus lanes and on roads with public road and rail [electric] transport stops in the city of Porto".

"The inspection will be conducted by STCP agents duly accredited by the National Road Safety Authority (ANSR), who will travel in identified STCP vehicles. The agents will have the authority to issue traffic tickets to offenders, in accordance with the provisions of the Traffic Code", the company says in a statement.

The STCP team will work in conjunction with the Porto Municipal Police, monitoring "areas of the city where abusive parking most affects public transport circulation, such as reserved circulation corridors (Bus lanes) or in the vicinity of bus and car electric spaces".

"To penalise improper parking, an inspection can be triggered by means of an alert given by the driver to the STCP Control Center, by a warning from the Control Center itself to the agents or even by daily rounds carried out by inspectors", explains the transport company.

According to the carrier, "the objective is to reduce disruptions to traffic, increasing commercial speed and regularity of service, which directly impact passengers' quality of life."

Between 2013 and 2023, the number of fines issued in the Bus lanes and at STCP stops fell by almost half, according to data from the transport company reported by the newspaper Público.

The average commercial speed of STCP's operation has been decreasing over the last few years, with 2005 being the last year in which the speed was lower than the 15.4 kilometers per hour recorded in 2023, something also reported by the newspaper.

Last week, automatic mobile monitoring of illegal parking by vehicles from the Porto Municipal Police began.

The new system consists of cameras installed in Municipal Police vehicles to control illegal parking, recording the license plates of offending vehicles.