Research Article COVID-19 Outbreak in Colombia: An Analysis of Its Impacts on Transport Systems Julian Arellana , 1 LuisM´ arquez, 2 and Victor Cantillo 1 1 Universidad del Norte, Barranquilla, Colombia 2 Universidad Pedag´ ogica y Tecnol´ ogica de Colombia, Tunja, Colombia Correspondence should be addressed to Julian Arellana; jarellana@uninorte.edu.co Received 9 April 2020; Revised 6 July 2020; Accepted 28 July 2020; Published 14 August 2020 Academic Editor: Stefano de Luca Copyright©2020JulianArellanaetal.isisanopenaccessarticledistributedundertheCreativeCommonsAttributionLicense, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. eglobalCOVID-19outbreakhasdemandeddrasticactionsandpoliciesfromthegovernmentsandlocalauthoritiestostemthe spread of the virus. Most of the measures involve behavioural changes from citizens to reduce their social contact to a minimum. us,theseactionsinfluenceindividualactivitypatternsandtransportsystemsindifferentways.ispaperstudiestheshort-term impacts on the transport system caused by the different policies adopted by the Colombian government and local authorities to contain the COVID-19 spread. Using official and secondary data concerning the seven most populated cities in Colombia, we analyse the impacts on three components of the transport system: air transport, freight transport, and urban transport. Results show that national policies and local decisions have decreased the demand for motorised trips across the cities, diminishing congestion levels, reducing transit ridership, and creating a reduction in transport externalities. e country banned air transport for passengers and only allowed air cargo for medical and necessary supplies, which will have negative consequences for the economics of the airline industry. During the first three months of the COVID-19, freight was the most resilient transport component. However, freight trips diminished around 38%, affecting mainly the supply chain of nonessential products. During the pandemic, governments need to provide subsidies to maintain the system supply to avoid crowdedness and promote active transport by allocating less-used street space to cyclists and pedestrians. In the short term, transportation service providers will face a financial crisis, deepened by the pandemic, which will require government assistance for their recovery. 1. Introduction e rapid spread of COVID-19 worldwide has generated a public health crisis that started in December 2019. In a few months, the virus spread worldwide from Wuhan, its epi- centre in China. e crisis has challenged the ability of the governments to take actions to protect their citizens and has tested cities’ transport system preparedness. On 31 January 2020, after 7,817 confirmed cases [1], the WHO declared the disease a Public Health Emergency of International Concern and called governments and public health authorities to intervene and contain the expected number of new infec- tions and deaths. Following the WHO recommendation, some govern- ments adopted drastic measures to stem the spread of the virus based on the Chinese experience and previous health crisis [2]. e experience from China suggested that it is possibletocontainthevirusifgovernmentsimplementtried and tested public health outbreak responses [3, 4]. Fur- thermore, Li et al. [5] suggest that during an epidemic, policymakers should prioritise measures to contain the spread of the disease instead of favouring economic activ- ities. erefore, most of the measures implemented worldwide involve promoting behavioural changes from citizens to reduce their social contact to a minimum and restricting their travel habits. Two months after the Public Health Emergency decla- ration, several cities worldwide were in lockdown, and countries had declared emergencies and mobilised extra funding to tackle the COVID-19 threat. ey were also suspending intracity public transport, closing entertainment venues, and banning public gatherings [6]. Nevertheless, the Hindawi Journal of Advanced Transportation Volume 2020, Article ID 8867316, 16 pages https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/8867316