The Spanish bus map is in the process of changing. Routes that do not make money, corridors that no one wants to access, companies that want to completely liberalize the sector and the doubt of, to what extent, foreign companies can enter to play in a foreign country.
And Spain is trying by all means to ensure that the latter does not happen.
What’s happening? If we follow Spanish regulations, right now a company dedicated to the transportation of passengers by bus cannot make international trips with stops to drop off and pick up travelers within Spain. Not, at least, permanently. The rule only allows this service to be carried out temporarily, in order to protect national routes.
That is, this prevents a company from opening a route, for example, between Lisbon and Paris and from picking up and dropping off passengers within Spanish territory at its stops within Spain (in Madrid and Barcelona, for example). It is understood that if this is possible it would be a direct competition to those who have been awarded those corridors.
How do buses work in Spain? Spain uses a concessional model for its bus lines. This means that a broker goes out to tender and companies present their proposals playing with the Price. The best offer is the one that wins the concession and the one that begins to operate during the agreed years.
The system has its advantages and disadvantages. Confebús, an association that defends this model, points out that it gives security to the client because transportation is guaranteed during the agreed years and a route cannot be abandoned. Companies like FlixBus are contrary because they understand that competition is limited and that they prevent the company from adapting to new circumstances.
These circumstances, for example, leave with the passage of time some concessions that have expired or concessions that have never been put out to tender. It is especially serious on bus lines where a high-speed railway operates in parallel, since the train is much more competitive in price and time. Of course, the main people affected by the abandonment of these lines are the residents of towns with intermediate stops.
And what about international travel? For some time now, Europe has wanted to liberalize the sector, as it has done with trains. Despite this, Spain is resisting and although at first it was proposed to jump to the direct competition model, in the end it wants to maintain the concessional system but with profound changes in the current map.
With this system, services through cabotage are prevented. That is, the company picks up and delivers passengers within the same country along an international route. This is the argument of Avanza and Alsa to defend the latest ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union that has ruled in favor of Denmark regarding the opening of a file by the European Commission.
However, the case that both companies put forward is not very representative of the open debate in Spain.
What has happened in Denmark? Denmark has regulated the occasional bus service that operates through cabotage in the country to a maximum of seven calendar days in a month. The formula is also applied at other times in France, as both companies use in a statement collected by 20Minutos.
Understanding that this contravened community rules, the European Commission has opened a file against Denmark but the Court of Justice of the European Union closes it, understanding that Denmark does not prevent the service, it only regulates it. That is, a company can act with a discretionary service through cabotage but within the regulations established by the country.
But… what is discretionary? Here is a big part of the issue. European organizations have been discussing whether or not Denmark allows cabotage service through discretionary routes but not regular routes.
Discretionary routes are those that do not have a fixed route or established times. That is, they do not always leave on the same day of the week and at the same time from a specific city, for example. They are the typical routes for trips by tourists or supporters who go to watch a soccer match in another country.
The limitation of those seven consecutive days within the same month that Denmark applies is designed so that foreign companies do not compete unfairly with their national companies, offering a regulated service camouflaged as discretionary.
Implications in Spain? None. This is what FlixBus defends. The travel company maintains that this regulation, contrary to what Avanza and Alsa points out, has nothing to do with the regular and international routes that companies like them propose for our country. Routes in which they would use cabotage to make the line more efficient.
They give as an example the route between Trier (Germany) and Madrid that FlixBus has requested with intermediate stops in Zaragoza and Barcelona that passengers could use to move within the national territory. The line has not been authorized and FlixBus appeals to the resolution of the European Commission of April 16 that forces Spain to open its lines to this service. Spain filed an appeal against this decision, which was rejected by the Court of Justice of the European Union.
What is Spain doing? Place all obstacles to the entry of new actors or the liberalization of bus lines, as demanded by Europe. The approval of the Sustainable Mobility Law on October 8, 2025 eliminated article 50, which allowed certain routes to be authorized in free competition.
That is, for now, the battle to open new international routes that allow the transfer of travelers within the same country continues. Spain has the obligation to comply, if we adhere to what is required by the European Commission, but, for the moment, it still has not given the green light to this possibility.
Photo | FlixBus y Eleazer Glez
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