The proposals are set to be discussed in a private meeting of the municipal executive, with today being considered “the last day of the suspension period” for new registrations of local accommodations in the city. This comes after an order by the mayor, Carlos Moedas (PSD), extended the suspension period, which would have ended on November 7.
Following the council’s vote, the approved proposals must be submitted to the Lisbon Municipal Assembly (AML) for them to be enacted. This meeting is scheduled for next Tuesday, December 2, the president of the AML, André Moz Caldas (PS), revealed.
The PS proposal aligns with the project to amend the Municipal Regulation of Local Accommodation (RMAL), approved by the council in December 2024 and subjected to public consultation between March and April this year. It advocates for reducing the ratios to 5% in areas of absolute containment and 2.5% in areas of relative containment.
Doubling these ratios, the PSD/CDS-PP/IL leadership’s proposal, signed by the councilor for Housing and Urbanism, Vasco Moreira Rato (an independent indicated by the PSD), suggests reducing it to 10% in absolute containment areas (10 AL per 100 homes) and to 5% in relative containment.
In the current RMAL, in effect since November 2019, absolute containment areas have a ratio between AL establishments and permanent housing units “over 20%” (more than 20 AL per 100 homes), and relative containment areas have a ratio “equal to or greater than 10% and less than 20%.” These areas are established based on homogeneous tourist zones (ZTH), with 15 demarcated in the city, including Bairro Alto/Madragoa, Castelo/Alfama/Mouraria, Colina de Santana in absolute containment.
The project to amend the RMAL submitted for public consultation, approved in the previous mandate (2021-2025), with the votes in favor from PSD/CDS-PP, PS, and PCP, abstention from Cidadãos Por Lisboa (elected by the PS/Livre coalition) and Livre, and against votes from BE, suggests three distinct scales for monitoring and containing AL in Lisbon: the municipality, the 24 parishes, and the 274 neighborhoods demarcated by the municipality.
The proposals from PS and PSD/CDS-PP/IL agree on creating “a single absolute containment area” at the municipal scale but differ on the ratio to apply, with socialists insisting on a ratio equal to or greater than 5%, as was in the project submitted for public consultation. Currently, that ratio in the city is at 7.2%, which would prevent new AL registrations.
Conversely, the new team of Carlos Moedas—consisting of IL, PSD, and CDS-PP—suggests that absolute containment of new AL registrations occurs “whenever the municipality reaches a ratio equal to or greater than 10%.”
In absolute containment areas, “new AL establishment registrations are not admissible,” whereas in relative containment areas, new registrations “can be subject to exceptional authorization by the Lisbon City Council, upon express permission.”
According to the PSD/CDS-PP/IL proposal, as of November 1 this year, six Lisbon parishes fall under absolute containment, namely Santa Maria Maior (66.9%), Misericórdia (43.8%), Santo António (25.1%), São Vicente (16.1%), Arroios (13.5%), and Estrela (10.8%). One other remains in relative containment, specifically Avenidas Novas (6.6%).
Regarding neighborhoods, nine fall under absolute containment—Bom Sucesso, Belém, Ajuda, Alcântara, São Bento, São Sebastião da Pedreira, Picoas, Sapadores, and Parque das Nações—and another 13 are in relative containment, according to the team of Carlos Moedas.
This proposal allows, in relative containment areas, the possibility of offering AL in the form of a “room” in T2 or larger homes that constitute the usual residence of the owner.
Other measures prevent exceptional AL authorizations in properties acquired at public auction; restrict complementary uses such as commerce, services, restaurants, and drinks inside accommodation establishments; and limit the transferability of registration titles in containment areas, safeguarding exceptions provided by law.
The RMAL amendment aims to ensure a sustainable balance between tourism activity and housing rights, promoting an urban development model favoring the population’s quality of life and territory protection, at a time when AL today represents “about 67% of the city’s tourist accommodation supply.”
To Público, a source close to Carlos Moedas’s office said “about 7,000 AL licenses are being canceled from a total of 18,600 due to lack of mandatory civil liability insurance.”
In the current mandate (2025-2029), social democrat Carlos Moedas governs in a minority, with eight elected from the PSD/CDS-PP/IL coalition, one shy of obtaining an absolute majority, which would require the election of nine of the 17 members that make up the capital’s executive. In the opposition are four PS councilors, one from Livre, one from BE, two from Chega, and one from PCP.
