Hop-on hop-off service

The Unscheduled Bus Service (UBS) has made various requests in the past years to the Malta Transport Authority (ADT) to operate a tourist hop-on hop-off transport service to places of cultural interest as one finds abroad.

The ADT did not take the UBS up on its offer and instead introduced a similar service but subsidised by the Malta Tourism Authority (MTA). This service is now being operated by the Public Transport Association (yellow buses).

This letter is not intended merely to express our members' disapproval and scepticism at this ADT/MTA adventure but mainly to highlight the fact that the UBS was put aside even though it is the sector most equipped to provide such a service and is one of the contributors towards MTA. Furthermore, the service is operated by a transport sector that has a guaranteed income and does not earn its living from tourism.

It would have been wiser for the authorities to concentrate their efforts to improve public transport rather than devising new ways of subsidising public transport at the expense of the interests of the other sectors.