Costa del Sol tram lent to Australian city 'to pay off town hall debts'
Costa del Sol tram lent to Australian city 'to pay off town hall debts'
A TRAM line on the Costa del Sol has been dismantled and posted to Australia.
Vélez-Málaga council spent 38 million euros on the tramway link between the town centre and the beach in 2007, but it has not been used for several years.
Funding cuts imposed when the recession began to bite meant the service gradually dwindled to nothing.
In a bid to reduce its ever-growing debts, Vélez-Málaga's local government has decided to rent the tram system to another city.
But not a city in Spain – the entire transport line is due to be shipped down under to be used in Sydney, Australia.
The famous Opera House harbour town and the country's second city after its capital, Canberra, already has a well-developed underground tube train network serving the entire metropolis.
The underground runs regularly to practically every corner of the city, including the airport – located in the former convicts' settlement of Botany Bay – with the only real exception being Bondi Beach, which can be reached by the regular bus lines that also complement the metro system everywhere else in Sydney.
Yet authorities in the capital of New South Wales and globally-popular backpackers' haunt consider that yet another public transport link would not go amiss.
