Porto metro system

[MarcVD]

We, wife and I, are in Porto for a few days. Mostly walking but using the metro once or twice a day. Wife will also use the metro for her return to the airport (I won't because I'll return to Brussels by train). The metro uses a zonal fare system, you pre-load the tickets you need on a smartcard and validate them as you go. We normally need two-zones tickets but she will need a four-zones one to go to the airport.

And hence the question : when you have different ticket types loaded on your smartcard, how do you tell, at validation time, which ticket type should be validated ?

 

[Lxd2]

From my limited experience of the system, I think you may need to buy two Andante cards - one loaded with the two-zones tickets, the other loaded with the four-zones tickets. But if anyone knows how it can be done on one card, please let me know as it would be useful.

 

[Belperpete]

If its anything like the system used in Lisbon, while you can load further tickets of the same type, you can't load a different type of ticket onto a card until the existing tickets have expired. I ended up with about 3 cards.

 

[Iskra]

You can simplify things by just using contactless payment on the blue tap-in readers. This is simpler and inexpensive.

 

[swr444]

You can simplify things by just using contactless payment on the blue tap-in readers. This is simpler and inexpensive.

only works at certain stations

 

[MarcVD]

I have indeed been caught. It does not let you chose. And picks the most expensive ticket available on the card first. So, will have to purchase that 4 zones ticket again, just before I need it. Porto métro is not expensive, so the loss is minimal, but it is a pity that this is not explained clearly anywhere. Otherwise I like that métro system. The frequencies on Sundays are a bit low, though.

Also, while I'm at it :

Two new métro lines are under construction. Lots of disturbances around Sao Bento station. As a result, tram tracks are interrupted and line 22 does not run. The other two, 1 and 18, are not affected.

Porto Campanha has 6 new stub tracks that do not seem to have much usage right now. I suspect they want to concentrate all services there and stop serving Sao Bento, which also has 6 tracks.

Our train to Pinhoa was diesel hauled, of course, (a 1400) but came from Campanha hauled by an electric. Never saw that livery before, is it new ?