Savings in new bus fares structure
The bus service reform will usher in new buses, and a new fares structure.
The Ministry of Transport and the Infrastructure this evening welcomed the GWU’s agreement in principle with the reform of the bus service, but said the union was misinterpreting the fares structure.
The union in a statement this afternoon (see http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20100527/local/gwu-says-bus-service-reform-should-not-mean-new-burdens ) said that while it acknowledged the need for a better service, this should not mean a financial burden for users and the rights of workers in the sector should be respected.
The ministry said the new fares structure would reward those who used the buses most.
Those who bought a three-month bulk ticket would be saving two euro cents every day compared to current fares. Furthermore, while at present, one had to buy a ticket for every trip made, under the new system one could board as many buses as he wished with the same ticket.
Students who bought the same three-month ticket would save an average of three euro cents compared to current fares. Fares for elderly travellers would be as present.
The ministry pointed out that the Maltese currently spend more than European families on their travel because they use their private cars.
Under the new system, should a worker who normally uses his car to go to work, opt to take a bus before 8 a.m., his fare would be €1.40. But the ticket could be used all day long.
The highest fare for a day ticket would be €2.10, which could be used throughout the day.
The ministry said the GWU was wrong when it said that one-way tickets would no longer exist. Two-hour tickets would cost €0.65 for those who needed to travel to nearby villages and €1.30 for the other routes.
Popular Stories
Update 3: Woman found dead in car,...
Updated: Woman dies in car crash
Carm Mifsud Bonnici resigns after...
Part of Dwejra 'Azure window' collapses
The end of the bar that ‘never closed’
Bundy does not know whether to...
Updated - Jason Micallef demands...
This WAS the night - Kurt makes it...
'No need for early election if PM's...
In Discussion
Updated - Jason Micallef demands...
Gozo tunnel could take 5-7 years to...
CABS remote controlled aircraft shot...
Carm Mifsud Bonnici resigns after...
Joseph Calleja condemns portrayal of...
Updated: Labour would give...
CABS drone shot down
Second group of migrants arrives
Adrian Vassallo in scathing...
38 Comments
Post comment
Please sign in or create your Account to post comments.
andre Muscat
May 28th 2010, 12:47
Are you ASHAMED to quote the price of a 3month tkt and just mention 2/3 euro cent savings.As it comes more then the price of today SINGLE FARE.
With todays rates it nearly costs the same in petrol for my son to go to tertiary education.Stop thinking in savings and see the alternative transport
What you need is a better service and with CHEAPER TKTS then todays for frequent travellers.THEN you will get people to increase the use of bus because there is a saving.plus u might get double the revenue since the pessimisticaly low percent of commuters will double or treble !!!!! The aim of the public service is to provide a good service and not see how you are going to milk the consumer and make a profit.THE PRESENT BOARD OF DIRECTORS SHOULD ALL BE MADE TO RETIRE.
The current thinking has already poved futile, as seen in the statistics of the past 10years how worse can it get 11% i believe. AND IF PRICES WILL INCREASE then you will see other forms of transport being organized privately and the service to the community compromised.WERE IS THE CONSUMER PROTECTION RIGHT.
R.Lewis
May 28th 2010, 09:47
Does that bus in the picture cost €120000 ??
c camilleri
May 28th 2010, 10:33
seems like it, yes the owner might take €120,000 home for it. It is a shame that my much nicer, more emission friendly but more taxed car is worth barely one tenth as much.
It pays to be a bus driver/owner today................
G Psaila
May 28th 2010, 09:35
Someone please enlighten me! I currently buy two bus tickets (Mon to Fri) @ 47c each, therefore it costs me 94c daily. Will I need to spend €1.40? In addition, I'm not interested in using public transport in the weekend. What sort of savings are they talking about?! Looks like a loss to me.
Fred Vellaa
May 28th 2010, 09:59
This Bus Bus been a mess all my life. The people who work, the buses and the timing and please why the stop at 23-00 hours. And the most stupid you see these Long John buses. We dont need big things on a so so so small inland. We are with stupid thinking. We think we know that much but this so so so so small inland been ruined for ages. The thing is it comes out of our most bright people who we had payed for, from our taxpayer money.
c camilleri
May 28th 2010, 09:11
Quote "Those who bought a three-month bulk ticket would be saving two euro cents every day compared to current fares." Unquote
Impressive savings!! Provided that in that 3 Month period, you never fail ONCE to take the bus (irrespective whether you are sick, take leave, not in a position to take a bus etc etc) and that you are always given the CORRECT change by the bus driver. (How many from you ever came across a tidy and well mannered bus driver who took the initiative to keep gratitudes for himself when giving you change, if at all?)
God bless all those who have no other choice but use the public transport. There are not so many left in Malta who can afford purchasing and running a car in Malta.
S Diacono
May 28th 2010, 09:09
So let me try to get this straight .... I, a normal worker, currently get a bus at 7am to go to work and then get another one back home at 5pm which costs me €0.47c times 2 = €0.94c per day. With the new system, if i understand well, I will be paying a minimum of €1.40 per day (and I dont give a damn that I can ride the bus as much as I want throughout the day because I will be sitting at my desk in my office, working). €1.40 per day is an INCREASE of 49% on my current cost of €0.94c. So, dear Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure, would you kindly indicate to me your so-called "savings in new bus fares structure" ? Please I welcome everyone to comment on this and contradict my reasoning as I humbly stand here to be corrected. In the meantime, I wonder whether this is just another dirty gimmick kindly presented to us free-of-charge by our dear authorities who think that we, common people, are just a bunch of dumb morons.
m grech
May 28th 2010, 08:41
What about people who work in valletta from 8.30 to 5.00pm. who spend 94cents on fares a day.?Whats the use of buying a day ticket at 2.10 when they only need to use 2 buses? That is an increase of 16cents a day.An increase of 86 cents per week. And this is to go to work.
John Falzon
May 28th 2010, 08:27
"Under the new system, should a worker who normally uses his car to go to work, opt to take a bus before 8 a.m., his fare would be €1.40. But the ticket could be used all day long."
Yes, but the point is that someone goes to the office and spends his day there, not out riding the buses! Then he takes a bus home. So two trips have cost him Euro 1.40, as opposed to todays 94 cents.
Well if buses are going to cost so much more to ride, then all I can say is thank God I have a car.
John Inguanez
May 28th 2010, 08:25
If I board the bus before 8am the fare is €1.40 and I work up to 5pm and return home; when could i could the ticket again, gentlemen of the Ministry?
If I buy a week ticket, and use the bus only for work, Am I not paying for Saturday and Sunday also, so the average for the five working days would be higher than today! Simple mathematcis and not need of IT knowledge, dear ministry? Any more permutations, If one tried and find will sure find he be worse off, with the new fare structure.
ccalleja
May 28th 2010, 07:37
I paid €2.20 for a one way metro ticket in Spain. So these fares are quite reasonable.
lgalea
May 28th 2010, 09:48
ccalleja I hope that you were not one of those who used to complain about the fares increases when the bus service was run by the private bus owners. This is apart from the distance travelled.
Joseph Casha
May 28th 2010, 06:39
so, best case scenario to go to work and back would be €2.10 for a daily. that's €10.50 a week (if i don't use it on weekends)
My moped uses €5.50 a week for fuel to get to work and back and maybe do some errands, include to that €110 a year for license and insurance which comes to €0.31 a day, so total would be around €1.10 a day............ Sorry to say but you can keep your public transport. It might be a reform with new buses, but at the end of the day, it will be the same guy behind the wheel giving the same service. Oh yeah, and to me personally, it's not worthed
Michael Vella
May 28th 2010, 06:21
In Holland I pay 3.€ from one bus stop to the other..............thats expensive. The prices you pay in Malta are the cheapest in the E.U.
lgalea
May 28th 2010, 09:51
Michael Vella So are our wages Michael
bjorn schembri
May 27th 2010, 23:32
@ A.J Borg
Nahseb mintix qed tghix f dinja ta. Gej tghid li l-ghola fl-ewropa. qed tahseb lin-nies qatt ma hargu min malta int.
David Spiteri
May 27th 2010, 22:31
1.30c euro is expensive for everyday passengers and students as today students pay only 23c when they have the pass. While on this subject it is good to know what pay the drivers have as till today no one mentioned it...
Ryan Sammut
May 27th 2010, 21:55
if I usually go to work and back, I used to spend 0.47c x 2 = 94c, now I pay €1.40
That said, if I get a lift to work, and I only need a lift back I would have to pay 73c more everyday, I'm not saving anything now am I?
Oh yeah the saving part is for those who buy 3 Month Tickets and save 2c each time, that's a WOW! and if that person gets sick and just missed 2 days work or is on leave, he/she already made a loss
Robert Mifsud
May 27th 2010, 21:48
What difference will it make if students would save 2 or 3 cents (euro).Whats the big deal for such poor savings.These are not attractive savings at all !
lgalea
May 28th 2010, 09:53
Robert Mifsud As they used to say "take care of the pennies and the pounds take care of themselves".
lgalea
May 28th 2010, 09:56
Robert Mifsud ps what I agree with you is that the interest paid by banks is not attractive at all since it falls withing your figures.
J Oatmon
May 27th 2010, 21:31
Dumping the old clunker polluting buses, and upgrading the service, would have been a better idea 10 years ago - now most familes have bought a car - because the buses were awful, and I can't see people selling their cars to ride the bus, even if the buses inprove dramatically.
I think the buses will remain a niche market, good for the tourists and a few Maltese, but unwanted by most, in this age of the car.
Compare ISAs
Jun 17th 2010, 09:24
Hat’s off. Well done, as we know that “hard work always pays off”, after a long struggle with sincere effort it’s done.
Compare ISAs
*************
Christina
B. Pollacco
May 27th 2010, 20:44
Just a question to TM are student fees are only for those who go to schools to/from with the bus or even students from MCAST,JC,UNI etc ?
Mary Mizzi
May 27th 2010, 20:23
Savings? For who?
One would have believed the Ministry with such a statement if there was any credibility left on such statements.
Riding buses is not pleasure cruising, especially for the locals who go on bus trips for their needs and not to go on and off all day for the sake of getting more rides per ticket.
Jesmond Micallef
May 27th 2010, 20:01
These prices are quite fair really in comparison to those I have paid in european cities.
A.J.Borg
May 27th 2010, 20:47
Jesmond, A €1.30 fare would be one of the highest in Europe for a bus service.
victor vella
May 27th 2010, 21:33
AJ Borg mela Tunisia mort int biss jew? a one day ticket in London cost me 20 pounds sterling last november
lgalea
May 27th 2010, 21:38
And what are their wages?
Jesmond Micallef
May 27th 2010, 21:49
I don't think so. I use the tram and the cheapest fare is €2.56 short trip return. Thats the cheapest rate if I buy a 5 short trip strip ticket in Nürnberg. A single short trip is € 1.60 oneway. A longer trip would be € 2.00 oneway. A short trip is maybe the equivalent of Valletta Terminus to "Bieb il-Bombi". The Tram and Bus services in Nürnberg are both operated by the same company. There is no price difference between the two and tram service is only restricted to areas where the tracks are, thats all.
S. Borg
May 27th 2010, 22:02
@AJ Borg. You gotta be kidding. A single trip bus ticket in London is 2 pounds sterling (about €2.4). In Rome, a 75-minute bus ticket is €1, while a day ticket is €4. In Madrid, a single bus trip costs €1.
steve smith
May 27th 2010, 22:38
you obviously not used buses in uk...you would pay at least twice as much for the same distance, thats why i never used them too expensive
Luke Buttigieg
May 27th 2010, 23:01
I haven't been all over the place, but the prices they're introducing are very fair, and I like the new card system vs buying just one ticket. Similar systems are used abroad, and the only reason why they're used is cos they work.
A.Attard
May 27th 2010, 23:50
@A.J Borg - please check before you say things. I paid about 2.60 british pounds for a short 5 minute journey in the u.k , and over 2 euros for another short journey in france only recently. And i'm already paying 1.16 euros for my 645 bus which i use daily , so its not much more.
lgalea
May 28th 2010, 08:54
What are their wages? How about those traveling after 8 and those not using the ticket within two hours who are going to see a sizable increase in their fare?
lgalea
May 28th 2010, 10:00
What I cannot understand by all those saying that the increase in fare prices are reasonable is how can an increase be justified when our wages, salaries and pensions have not been increased and have continuously been eroded by increase in prices of everything that you can imagine. Would you have said the same if the old bus owners had demanded these increases? Would you have said the same if there was a PL government that approved these increases? Are you masochists?
N. Psaila
May 28th 2010, 10:04
It is true that in Rome and other European cities 1 trip costs €1 and a whole day costs €4 (or thereabouts) and *lgalea, this reflects the wages as they will be lower in Malta.
However reduced rates for students and the elderly cannot be compared to the standard rates. In fact a reduced fair ticket for 1 month costs just €18 (for busses, underground metro and trams). If students are going to save 3c per day, then reducing say €0.94 (two trips per day) to €0.91 and multiply by 3 months, you do the maths.
Jesmond Micallef
May 28th 2010, 10:16
Igalea,
Wages and taxes go hand in hand. In Germany, a middle level engineer may earn somewhere between €32K to €36K. Single unmarried people fall into class one tax at 45% rate, add on top of that additional Church tax and the other contributions, resulting in a clean cut 50% pocket money.
A small 30 square meter single person accomodation would cost somewhere between €280 to €320 monthly rent, raw. Water, Heating, Electricity, Garbage collection are all extra.