Capital ideas
The new regulation, which will be binding for all European public transport systems in two years' time, was a topic of keen interest at a meeting of public transport professionals earlier this fall in the Croatian capital of Zagreb. The event was a working group meeting of SPUTNIC, a project funded by the European Commission under the Sixth Framework Programme, which is dedicated to addressing challenges faced by local and regional public transport systems in transition economies. Participants included representatives from public transport operators, as well as local authorities from across Europe.
Operators at the Zagreb meeting agreed that unfunded social discounts can be a serious problem. In virtually all cities, passengers with discounted passes make up a large share of ridership. In the city of Warsaw, for example, there are social discounts for 29 categories of people. Along with the usual categories (e.g. pensioners, students, physically handicapped) are: victims of Nazi and Soviet persecution, blood donors, Second World War veterans — and persons who can certify that they were born in public transport vehicles! Due partly to this wide range of discounts, public transport in Warsaw is 66-percent dependent on public subsidies, the highest rate in Europe.
In the Bulgarian capital of Sofia, discount transport passes are given to more than 200,000 users. Metodi Avramov, head of the economic department at Sofia Public Transport Company Ltd., said his city is grappling with the financial burdens of discounts that were decreed by the city council 10 years ago. The problem with such breaks is not that they exist; the difficulty is when the city gives discounts without budgeting for it, according to the department head.
"A city can't have a social policy of discounted public transport fares without paying for it," Avramov added, "because in the end, the burden will fall on the operator."
