Euskotren is the leading public transport operator in the Basque Country and carries more than 30 million people a year.
Euskotren offers a public service based on quality, safety and efficacy that meets the mobility needs of disabled citizens and ensures a greater degree of freedom in the transport of freight.
Each one of the services offered is provided under the corresponding brand name:
- Euskotren trena: train services and Larreineta cable car
- Euskotren tranbia: Bilbao and Vitoria-Gasteiz tram services
- Euskotren autobusa: road transport
- Euskotren kargo: Transport of goods
Mission
Euskotren's mission is to promote sustainable suburban and intercity mobility, transporting people in the best conditions of safety, comfort and punctuality, under eco-efficient criteria, and helping to improve the quality of life in our environment, aligning the interests of the company with the values of users, and embracing the public interest.
Ideal
Euskotren wishes to manage public resources responsibly for the greater well-being of the people and meet the mobility needs of today’s generations while regularly reassessing our services, work methods, and service quality to adapt to the changing demands of citizens.
History
Since it was founded over 40 years ago, Euskotren has become the leading transport operator in the Basque Country, thanks to its public service based on quality, efficiency and safety. Passengers' travel needs are met by the railway and funicular railway (Euskotren trena), tramway (Euskotren tranbia), and bus (Euskotren autobusa) services, and freight is transported by rail (Euskotren kargo).
In 1982, Euskotrenbideak started to work on restoring a transport network considered to be vital to ensure the mobility of Basque citizens.
The Basque Country already had important tramway networks in the past. In 2002, the first step was taken for its reintroduction with the opening of the first modern tramway in Bilbao, followed by Vitoria-Gasteiz in 2008, both operating under the name of EuskoTran, and now known as Euskotren tranbia.
In March 2022, a new section (Atxuri-Bolueta) came into service on the Bilbao Tramway, as the result of the works by Euskal Trenbide Sarea-Basque Railway Network (ETS) to expand the tramway to Bolueta, during which two new stops were added. The tramway service between Bolueta and La Casilla therefore currently has a total of 16 stops.
ETS extending the service to Salburua in the city of Vitoria-Gasteiz is more recent. That meant that a new section between Florida and Salburua with 5 new stops came into service on 11 April 2024. The Vitoria-Gasteiz tramway service currently runs from Abetxuko to Unibertsitatea and from Ibaiondo to Salburua, every 15 minutes and with a total of 28 stops (7 of which are on the Centro shared section, between Honduras and Florida, where there is a tram every 7.5 minutes).
In 2017, Euskotren began to operate Line 3 (Matiko-Kukullaga/Etxebarri) of the Metro underground, which also connects Txorierri to the general line (Bilbao-Donostia-Hendaia and Bilbao-Bermeo).
The current management of five rail lines, an underground line, the Larreineta funicular railway, two tramway services (Bilbao and Vitoria-Gasteiz) and several bus lines in Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa endorses Euskotren’s track record, and meets the travel needs of millions of people a year. In 2023, Euskotren reached a record high in demand for its public transport services with 47.9 million passengers, which was up 21.36% on the previous year.
Even though Euskotren celebrated forty years as a publicly-owned company in May 2022, its roots can in fact be traced back to 1882, when its oldest line - the railway from Bilbao to Durango - came into service. Down through these 140 years, the railway has generated a rich heritage in the Basque Country that Euskotren has always successfully showcased. Thus, it opened its Basque Railway Museum in 1994. It is based in the old Azpeitia station (Gipuzkoa) and boasts one of Europe’s most important collections of narrow-gauge rolling stock.