Transport Scotland said the compendium Scottish Transport Statistics publication released on Wednesdeay shows that travel across a range of modes increased over the latest reporting year, but generally remains below pre-pandemic levels.

“The most recent statistics show that there were 334 million bus journeys in 2024/25, an increase of 2% compared to 2023/24 but 7% below the number of journeys in 2019/20,” said Transport Scotland.

“There were 84.7 million passenger journeys on ScotRail services in 2024/25, an increase of 4% compared with 2023/24, but 12% lower than the 96 million passenger journeys in 2019/20.

“Motor traffic also rose in 2024. The distance driven by motor vehicles on Scotland’s roads increased by 2% to 49.3 billion vehicle kilometres in 2024. This is slightly above the 2019 figure of 48.7 billion vehicle kilometres.”

Other findings presented in the publication include:

• There were 28 million air passengers at Scottish airports in 2024, an increase of 8% in the last year, although this was down 2% compared with 2019.
• There were 9.7 million passengers on ferry services in 2024, with 8 million passengers on routes entirely within Scotland. Ferry passenger numbers in 2024 were similar to 2023, but 7% lower than in 2019.
• On-road cycling is estimated to have decreased by 5% in 2024 compared to 2023. However, this was still 5% higher than 2019.
• The number of motor vehicles registered in Scotland (3.2 million) is at an all-time high.

Transport Scotland added: “Amongst different types of motor vehicles, the distance travelled by cars has not reached pre-pandemic levels. The distance driven by cars increased by 2 per cent in 2024 compared with 2023, but was still 2 per cent lower than in 2019. The distance driven by Light Goods Vehicles (LGVs) has seen an increase of 17% since 2019.”

The latest figures for greenhouse gas emissions relate to 2023 and these show that greenhouse gas emissions from transport were 10% lower than in 2019.

Greenhouse gas emissions in 2023 were 17% higher than in 2020, when transport was reduced as a result of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Transport accounted for 33.2% of Scotland’s total greenhouse gas emissions in 2023, 1 percentage point more than in 2019 and in 2022 (both 32.2%).