Those who top up their tallinja card with €10 will get an additional €10 to spend on public transport usage in a bid to ease school traffic, Transport Minister Joe Mizzi said today.

The campaign, he said, would see 120,000 cards benefit from this one-time offer which will continue until the end of October or when funds run out.

Mr Mizzi said the campaign is expected to cost some €1.2 million. The campaign, which is being funded by Transport Malta’s EU funded Modus initiative, would be part of the government’s efforts to ease traffic congestion. These included the introduction of new routes and the setting up of new priority lanes.

The Transport Minister said less than 1% of those who had a tallinja card were still experiencing problems.

He said public transport users were expected to increase by some 8%.

Parliamentary Secretary Ian Borg said the government had more financing to tap and so the public could expect more initiatives before the end of the year.