Bus empty? So what!

Photo: Peeter Langovits / Postimees

The subsidies system for county lines robs bus companies of motivation to increase amounts of passengers: subsidies rise, ranks of riders get thinner. 

Two years back, the state bought 110 so-called quota buses, for €19m. To be more exact: Road Administration entered into the contract, in the name of the state. The money came from sales of CO₂ quotas to Spain.

The buses trickled into Estonia during 2012 and the beginning of 2013. Now, all are on the roll: ten inside of Tallinn, 42 in Ida-Viru County, and 58 in Harju County. The buses belong to the state; the bus companies/carriers can use them free of charge. «Cloud-buses» these are called, due to blue-white bodies. Big (44 seats), beautiful, clean and comfortable.

It’s comfy to ride these and seats are plenty. Heading from Balti Railway Station, Tallinn, towards Kose, only one more person joined me on board. Another joined us at Sossi hill. The three of us journeyed merrily through Vaida and Tuhala, close to 60 kilometres. Took us an hour and 10 minutes, with many a stop. Our way back was somewhat more fruitful: four people boarded the bus in Kose; along the way, the bus picked up five more – nine exited the vehicle in Tallinn. Travelling the Harju County in the empty bus, I couldn’t shake the question: is this prudent, and what will this cost?

Not all subsidised

Rough math revealed that a bus ride costs about 1 euro per kilometre, containing driver’s wages, taxes, fuel and capital costs (purchase of buses) and all kinds of current marketing and administrative costs. In a situation where the state has covered the bus-buying costs, the county lines may have to pay up some 70–80 cents per km. Based on the Tallinn–Kose example, this could amount to €40-47 of costs per trip. With three persons travelling (ticket costs €3), income from tickets would be €7.5, excluding the taxes. This is notional, of course, as many people ride for half price or for free. So, probably, the income is smaller still.

But whatever the exact sums, one thing is clear: such an arrangement of things does not even come close to making ends meet. But why should it – as the state pays? And, naturally, this is not limited to Harju County: examples abound from Saaremaa all the way to Võru County.

It’s not all black and white, of course. The buses are not always empty and not all days are exactly alike. It may well be that an early morning bus leaves Tallinn empty, coming back full bringing folks to work.

Reading the Harju County bus timetable, counting up the arrivals/departures and adding to this Road Administration’s statistics on numbers of travellers, county wise, the average Harju County bus carries ten persons.

The state pays

Lots of commercial lines do business in Harju County, as well. These are the buses not subsidised by state, totally dependent on ticket money. These minibuses make their departures from the Solaris Centre, Tallinn.

As experienced riders well know: to get a seat, show up 15-20 minutes in advance, minimum. Otherwise, you won’t get in and are left behind.

Coming back to the public state-subsidised lines – the law says: connections must be guaranteed and whether a village has 300, 30 or 3 inhabitants – that should not matter, as all have the right to travel. This is precisely what they are saying, at Road Administration for instance, regarding inside-Estonia travel administration.

Still, even considering all the above nuances, one will ask: is this an optimal system? Isn’t somebody just burning money, not even thinking if there was a better way?

Leaving the bus-purchasing money aside, the state last year spent €21.4m to subsidise county lines of Estonia; to this communes and towns added €2.8m.

Actually, the main problem of the public, state subsidised, county bus lines is obvious. Talking to parties involved – bus companies (carriers), economy ministry, county governments, public transport centres, communes and towns – none of these are, in their activities, motivated by the numbers of travellers i.e. whether people board the buses or not. 

Mart Prikk, chief and owner of AS Samat offers detailed descriptions of two business models. His company has been into the minibus business for over 15 years, living on ticket money only. Samat being vitally interested in having people on board; every day, the company gets «grass roots» feedback via ticket sales.

However, Samat also works with the public subsidised lines, the cloud bus business – having won the Harju County southern lines competition. Here, says Mr Prikk, things are altogether different: the routes and stops are prescribed. The bus company has no say: people or not, Samat keeps mum and rides on. No big deal, as ticket income matters not.

Another bus company boss puts it even plainer: riding the county lines, carriers have no need of passengers, whatsoever. Best if nobody hops aboard – the people may bother the driver and smear the bus seats. Money comes by state subsidies, paid according to kilometres – of course – not to passengers.

And: with bus companies in direct daily contact with passengers lacking motivation, what about the guys higher up? None, really, and that’s the way the system works.

The money comes from state budget via economy ministry; the ministry having delegated arrangements to Road Administration. In counties, the county governments are in charge – either directly or via public transport centres. And, finally, there are the town and communes, whose sole interest is that buses go as often as possible – to the very last farmhouse. To achieve this, commune elders go to county governors and scream into their ears.

So that’s the picture: everyone has their own interests; even so, no one has a direct interest to carry passengers – not one job, no single result, bonus or sacking depending on numbers of people on buses.

«This is exaggeration; it is not really all that bad. True: at times, commune elders trample their feet, perhaps, but we don’t have totally irrational requirements all that often,» soothingly says Ago Kokser, head of Harju County public transport centre, calming the journalist down. 

Lack of coordination

Harju County public transport centre is a rarity in Estonia, for yet another reason: namely, they are the only one with some resources (people). Following the common ticket system launched at the end of last year, they have started to get real-time information on passengers and lines – the picture is patchy, but at least it exists.

The result being, says Mr Kokser, they are taking a closer look now at how the buses fill up. «Where it is zero, we cancel the line,» says he.

Mr Kokser admits, however, to some absurd lines in Western Harju County with dozens of kilometres covered carrying a passenger or two. «I’d like to cancel these, but I’m not allowed to. While the state has the money, we ride,» says the man.

All told, Harju County bus traffic is still decent in the pan-Estonian context, as we will kindly not mention the lack of basic coordination with train connections and the fact that, in reality, Harju transport scheme ought to also cover parts of Rapla County – the populous spots like Kohila and Rapla being closer to Tallinn than the county periphery.

To make public transport better, experts offer two solutions. The first: placing the motivation with bus companies, making these interested in earning ticket money. The head of one bus company says that, at subsidised lines, ticket income and subsidies should be 50:50. Currently, such a ratio is only found in Ida-Viru County; in all others, it is much more unequal.

The other version is altogether different, centring on public transport centres. This is the way it is done in Finland and Sweden, where very many people, much money and huge amounts of time and analysis is laid into planning the lines network – and corrections thereof, as needed. As said, in Estonia we only have some small beginnings of that in Harju County.

«Actually, in Harju County, we should have planning of train traffic, bus connections and urban lines at one and the same table; but we don’t have that,» admits Mr Kokser. «That would be the Greater Helsinki or Greater Stockholm king of approach.»

Bus traffic in Harju County

•    Over the past four years, amount of users of county bus lines has increased from 4,700 to 5,900; on workdays, there are about 630 departures – depending slightly on the day. «User» not meaning one person, but trips done by one person – like: to work and back, multiple times a day. Tallinn excluded, Harju County has 160,000 inhabitants; to this, about 400,000 Tallinners are added.

State subsidies

•    2012 – €21.4m

•    2011 – €20.8m

•    2010 – €20.5m

•    2009 – €19.8m

Passengers per year

•    2012 – 18.1 million

•    2011 – 18.1 million

•    2010 – 18.6 million

•    2009 – 19.1 million