Municipal councilors overtake talks on privatization of Urban Bus Fleet

The Chisinau Urban Bus Fleet is to be modernized or even privatized. A decision in this sense was voted on Thursday, October 30, by the local councilors, after ascertaining that the Council pays 80 million lei in order to keep buses and to compensate expenditures for transporting passengers, Info-Prim Neo reports. According to the company’s director, Iacob Capcelea, the real cost of a bus ride is 4.77 lei. The passengers pay 2 lei. The rest of the sum is paid from the municipal budget. The local councilors voted to allocate 4 million lei for the Urban Bus Company used to prepare the vehicles for the cold period , and other 3 million for the Electric Transport Fleet. The company’s director, Gheorghe Morgoci, stated that money would be used to re-equip 10 trolleybuses. 7 trolleybuses have already been re-equipped this year, and the eighth one is to start running next week. According to Morgoci, to re-endow a trolleybus costs between 250 and 300 thousand lei, while it takes 3 million lei to buy a new one.