Brazil: 2 schemes to know about before you drive in.
Salvador has 2 driving restrictions on our books: the Áreas de Restrição Centro Histórico (limited traffic zone) and the Áreas de Restrição de Circulação (ARC) (heavy vehicle ban). What is a limited traffic zone?
Sources last read on 2026-09-13, from the authorities' own pages. The next scheduled check is 2026-12-12.
| Scheme | Kind | Fine |
|---|---|---|
| Áreas de Restrição Centro Histórico | limited traffic zone | not in our sources |
| Áreas de Restrição de Circulação (ARC) | heavy vehicle ban | 130.16 BRL |
Six streets of Salvador's historic centre are closed to general traffic, and unlike the city's lorry restriction this one reaches every vehicle, including a private car.
Transalvador, the municipal traffic superintendency, states that circulation is restricted on Porta do Carmo, Leovigildo de Carvalho, João de Deus, Das Laranjeiras, Santa Isabel and the Largo do Pelourinho — the heart of the Pelourinho, the UNESCO-listed quarter. There is no charge, no day pass and no barrier: access is by registration or not at all.
Residents who can prove they have a parking space of their own are guaranteed access once they register with Transalvador; tourism coaches and taxis registered with the mobility secretariat SEMOB may set down and pick up passengers on those streets at signposted places; and loading and unloading is allowed in signposted areas from Monday to Saturday between 07:00 and 11:00. Everyone else is simply out.
What makes this record firmer than Salvador's other entry is that here we hold the instrument itself, in the publisher's own gazette: Portaria nº 416/2015 of the Transalvador superintendency, signed 3 November 2015 and published in the Diário Oficial do Município of 6 November 2015, Ano XXIX nº 6.456, page 9, which Transalvador hosts as a PDF beside the rule.
Two things the portaria does not do, and neither is guesswork on our part: it puts no clock on the restriction — the only hours in it belong to the loading window — and it names no article of the federal traffic code behind the fine, leaving enforcement to its own Gerência de Fiscalização de Trânsito "em conformidade com o Código de Trânsito Brasileiro", so there is no amount here to quote.
Salvador keeps large lorries off its main corridors at the busiest hours of the day.
The test is the size of the vehicle, not what it emits and not what it weighs: Transalvador, the city's traffic authority, states that a caminhão de grande porte — a lorry above 6.5 metres long and 2.2 metres wide — together with tratores, agricultural and construction tractors, may not drive in the Áreas de Restrição de Circulação between 06:00 and 10:00 Monday to Saturday, or between 17:00 and 20:00 Monday to Friday.
On the Orla, the seafront strip, a third window runs 09:00 to 20:00 on Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays. The restriction is not only about moving: Transalvador writes that the ARC also mean no stopping, no parking and no loading or unloading inside them.
Below the threshold nothing applies — a car, a van, a motorcycle or a lorry at or under 6.5 metres and 2.2 metres circulates freely at every hour — and there is nothing to pay and no day pass to buy. Veículos Urbanos de Carga, the small urban delivery lorries, are exempt by name and may circulate on any day at any time.
Construction and renovation firms working inside the restricted areas apply instead for an Autorização Especial de Tráfego, Carga e Descarga.
The areas themselves are a closed list: a ring of central avenues enclosing the commercial core, the whole seafront contour from the Largo da Calçada to the Jardim dos Namorados, and nineteen further named avenues and streets including the Paralela, the Bonocô, the ACM and a stretch of the BR-324.
One thing to understand before you rely on this entry: Transalvador states the rule on four of its own channels and names no decree or portaria behind it on any of them, and we could not settle the question, because Salvador's official gazette is not searchable by its contents. What we can tell you is that the rule is enforced and that the authority publishes it in the present tense.