Going electric

PALMA’s first electric mu‐nicipal bus is now in service.

The zero emissions, 12‐metre‐long vehicle began covering the L29, L40 and L39 lines on Monday and will cover different routes over the next few days.

show entitled ‘A la fresca’, a story‐telling marathon for children of different ages at several points in the town at 5pm and 6pm, and finally a concert by Manacor String Orchestra at the Claustre at 8pm. But this is all just a taste of everything going on in the next few days, visit Mana cor.org and search ‘La setmana del Llibre’.

Shopping discounts

THE Palma Activa shop ‐ping discount campaign has started up again after it was interrupted by problems with the IT sys ‐tem at the end of March.

Palma Town Hall has announced that the cam ‐paign picked up at the same point it left off, so shoppers are advised to check the website to see which businesses still have coupons left for the first batch of discounts, of which 20 per cent have al‐ready been used.

Shoppers can now claim nine vouchers ‐ with a maximum of three to be used at any one establish‐ment ‐ offering discounts of €10 for every €16 spent.

A maximum of €30 can be discounted from €48 spent at each business participating in the cam ‐paign. Shoppers are re ‐ minded that the offer is available to anyone aged over 16 in possession of a NIE/TIE identity card.

A record 400 local shops and businesses are taking part in the scheme this year.

For further information visit palmaactiva.com.

It was bought with funds from the EU’s Next Genera‐tion plan and is the first of 12 all‐electric buses to join the Palma fleet.

The newly designed ve‐hicles award greater visibili‐ty for drivers and more comfort for passengers, with larger windows that let in more natural light and thus help consume less en‐ergy on artificial lighting.

Each bus has three 430‐kilowatt batteries with an autonomy of up to 18 hours, which will greatly re‐duce carbon dioxide emis‐sions on the island.

They are part of a gener‐al overhaul of the EMT public transport system that will provide 30 per cent more capacity.