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Problem of Public Transportation in Yerevan: Drivers Can’t Make Ends Meet if Don’t Violate the Law

The plan by now former mayor Karen Karapetyan to relieve downtown Yerevan from public transportation vehicles is not yielding any results, asserted several residents of the Armenian capital who spoke with Epress.am these past couple of days.

Though reforms in the transport sector led to bus stops for intra-city buses entering Yerevan being moved outside the downtown core and university start times were pushed back by half an hour (9:30 am instead of 9 am), there are still traffic jams in the capital’s main streets, and particularly in the morning, while public transportation continues to operate at overcapacity.

Yerevan City Hall’s Information and Public Relations Department informed Epress.am that according to the figures by the city’s transport division, 243 buses, 1,850 minibuses and 49 trolley buses operate in the capital on average every day.

That, basically, isn’t enough to transport the flow of passengers. Yerevan residents speaking to Epress.am were dissatisfied with the overcapacity of the public transportation system.

“Every morning I’m forced to be late to work since the Number 30 minibus is filled to capacity — there isn’t even room to stand, even though they’re on schedule. Nevertheless, it’s impossible to ride this minibus in the mornings,” Davtashen resident Marina Avetisyan told Epress.am.

A group of students coming to Yerevan from Argavand were complaining about both the schedule and the full load. According to them, you need a lot of patience and strong nerves to get to Yerevan.

“Every day it’s the same situation. The vehicles come once every 30 minutes, and let’s not talk about overcapacity. Even if we succeed in getting to the city by standing in the bus, it doesn’t matter, we get to class late,” the students said.

Others complained of just about everything.

“Often because I’m late, I find some way of squeezing in, and leaning on the door, I rush to work — taking into consideration that I might fall out of the door. The overcapacity of public transportation has become such a big problem that we’ve begun not paying attention to the deplorable state [of the vehicles]. The inconveniences are many: the draft coming in from the partially closed windows, the broken seats, the doors that barely close, the unhygienic state,” said 57-year-old Razmik Petrosyan.

It’s noteworthy that complaints can be heard not only from passengers but also from the dispatchers, one of whom, who wished to remain anonymous, told Epress.am that drivers are few and largely refuse to do this work.

“It’s very difficult today to work as a bus driver, considering several proposed conditions. A large part of the vehicles are in extremely poor condition and they are in constant need of repair. And repairs are done by both the driver and the company servicing the route, since the drivers often simply aren’t able to pay for repairs on their own. Though it is strictly prohibited to pick up more passengers than there are seats, nevertheless, drivers break this law and carry more passengers [than allowed],” said the dispatcher.

According to the dispatcher, on their route, the driver has to pay the company owner 9,000 drams ($24 USD) per day. If drivers only pick up as many passengers as there are seats, then they almost certainly won’t be able to pay this fee and on top of that to make a profit.

Very often drivers refuse work because “there’s nothing left at the end of the day”. For this reason you can often find the notice “Looking for drivers to work” posted in minibuses.