Mallorca protest demands end date for horse carriages

Mallorca animal welfare groups gather in Palma on Saturday, 26 September, to demand a firm end date for horses pulling tourist carriages. The protest starts at 11.00 at Plaça de la Seu. Five organisations want Palma City Council to turn its promise to replace the carriages with electric vehicles into a binding rule.

Anima Naturalis, Peta, Satya Animal, the Franz Weber Foundation and Progreso en Verde say the city’s latest deal with carriage operators leaves the horses without a deadline or penalties if the change does not happen.

Dispute over the electric switch

Palma and the carriage trade signed their second agreement in March 2026 to replace horse-drawn carriages with electric vehicles. The groups say the 28 operators have only volunteered to buy the vehicles themselves, at about 40,000 euros each, and no approved local ordinance yet backs that commitment.

They point to an earlier agreement from 2022 that set 2024 as the target year to remove horses from service. According to the groups, proposed funding of 250,000 euros from the central government, plus an earlier 70,000-euro allocation, was never used.

Heat rules and calls for a plan

The campaigners also cite a ruling by the Balearic Islands High Court which struck down a change to Palma’s rules restricting carriage traffic in extreme heat. They say horses can therefore still pull carriages during yellow weather warnings, which apply in southern Mallorca from 36 degrees.

At Saturday’s protest, the groups will demand a binding municipal ordinance, a final date for animal traction and a formal plan for every horse taken out of service. The action follows weekly protests held in Palma each Saturday in September.

Pressure has grown after a video showed a carriage driver spraying a tourist with water after she asked him to give his horse water. Palma City Council opened an information procedure into the driver. The groups also say two carriage horses collapsed in central Palma in less than three days last September, six months before the March agreement.

Other Mallorca towns have already introduced rules: Capdepera banned animal traction in 2016, Alcúdia voted in 2023 to replace carriages with approved electric vehicles, and Muro adopted its own regulation in 2024.

Topics: Tourism · Politics · Palma · Capdepera · Alcúdia · Muro

Source: Europa Press / Mallorca.com