Buses

The service operated under Ethel (Greek: ?T??) Thermal Bus Company is the main operator of buses in Athens. It consists of a network of 300 bus lines which span the entire Attica Basin,with an operating staff of 5,327, and a fleet of 1,839 buses.Of those 1,839 buses 295 run on natural gas,making up the largest fleet of natural gas-run buses in Europe.

Besides being served by a fleet of natural-gas and normal buses, the Athens metropolitan area is also serviced by electric buses, or ILPAP, as the service is known in Athens (Greek: ?????). The Electric Buses of the Athens and Pireaus Region (ILPAP) consists of 22 lines and an operating staff of 1,137,and the network operates a fleet of 366 trolley buses able to run on diesel in case of power failure.

Tram line

The tram operator has a fleet of 42 trams which serve 47 stations, employ 345 people with an average daily occupancy of 80,000 passengers.This network runs from Syntagma Square to the southwestern suburb of Palaio Faliro, where the line splits in two branches; the first runs along the Athens coastline toward the southern suburb of Glyfada, while the other heads toward the Piraeus district of Neo Faliro. Both the Syntagma - Palaio Faliro - Neo Faliro and the Syntagma - Glyfada lines opened on 19 July 2004, with further extensions planned towards the major commercial port of Piraeus, and the southernmost suburb of Vouliagmeni.

Taxis

There is a plentiful supply of taxis in Athens. They are generally cheap, and during rush hour it is often considered normal to flag down a taxi when not more than one or two other customers are already in (although, officially, this is forbidden); convention dictates that if the second passenger happens to be heading in a similar direction and the original passenger has no complaints (seldom if ever is this an issue), he/she joins the journey, and both passengers give the fare as they would if travelling alone.

Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport

Athens is served by the state-of-the-art Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport (AIA) located near the town of Spata, in the eastern Messoghia plain, some 35 km (22 mi) east of Athens.The airport was awarded the "European Airport of the Year 2004" Award.Intended as an expandable hub for the air travel in southeastern Europe, it was constructed in a record 51 months costing 2.2 billion Euros, and employing a staff of 14,000.An express bus service is provided, connecting the airport to the metro system, and 2 express bus services connect the airport to the port at Piraeus and the city centre respectively. Eleftherios Venizelos accommodates 65 landings and take-offs per hour, with its 24 passenger boarding bridges, 144 check-in counters and broader 150,000 square metres (1,615,000 sq ft) main terminal,and a commercial area of 7,000 square metres (75,300 sq ft) which includes cafes and duty-free shops.In 2006, the Airport handled 15,079,662 passengers, an increase of 5.6% over the previous year of 2005.Of those 15,079,662 passengers, 5,468,574 passed through the airport for domestic flights, and 9,611,088 passengers travelled through for international flights.Beyond the dimensions of its passenger capacity, AIA handled 190,872 total flights in 2006, or approximately 523 flights per day.

Railways, highways and ferry connections

Interchange at the Attiki Odos near the Athens International Airport.

Interchange at the Attiki Odos near the Athens International Airport.

Athens is the hub of the country's national railway system (OSE), connecting the capital with major cities across Greece and abroad ( Istanbul , Sofia etc.). However, this system is not very extensive, largely due to geomorphological reasons. Ferries departing from the major port of Piraeus connect the city to the numerous Greek islands of the Aegean Sea . There are two main highways; one heading towards the western city of Patra in Peloponessus (GR-8A, E94) and the other heading to the north, towards Greece's second largest city, Thessaloniki (GR-1, E75). In 2001-2004, a ring road toll-motorway (Attiki Odos) was gradually completed, extending from the western industrial suburb of Elefsina all the way to the Athens International Airport . The Ymittos Periphery Highway is a separate section of Attiki Odos connecting the eastern suburb of Kaisariani to the northeastern town of Glyka Nera ; this is where it meets the main part of the ring road. The span of the Attiki Odos in all is 70 km. .