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Azerbaijan may offer vacant shuttles in Baku to new businesses

27 September 2008 13:43 (UTC +04:00)

He added that the ministry should have taken the decision to take away the minibuses from the city transport after exploring the results and financial position of the population.
â€œThe ministry carries out this without a plan. The citizens and their financial position are not taken into account. Imagine that a citizen gets on two buses to reach the city center and is charged twice,â€ he said.
The Ministry of Transport removed about 1 000 minibuses out of public transportation in Baku to replace them with full-size buses.
The ministry said in a statement that the measure was taken to do away with Â«traffic congestionÂ» on the road, to make the transport system more rational amid the construction of modern roads, bridges, overpasses, improvement of the regulatory framework regulating the public transport etc.
Under these comprehensive measures the entry of minibuses to the central streets of Baku was restricted.
he admitted that the bus companies were warned in advance to replace their minibuses with buses.
â€œHowever, there are some reasons why they didnâ€™t buy new buses. For example, the bus businesses have no guaranteed licenses and contracts. They get licenses for 5 years and the ministry revokes their licenses after 3 months with some reason,â€ he noted.
The Ministry told APA-Economics that there is a need for about 1 000 buses in Baku.
According to the ministry, about 50 Daewoo and tens of MAN buses will be delivered to Baku in a few days.
Up to now, 200 Daewoo, 40 MAN, 20 MAZ and 350 other full-size buses were imported for Baku.
Namig Hasanov, Secretary of the Ministry, told APA-Economics that the businesses undertook to replace minibuses with buses until 2009 when they were given licenses.
â€œThey have to fulfill their undertakings. We are monitoring the public transportation in Baku and remove non-standard buses from shuttles. This is a temporary problem and citizens need to use alternative shuttles.
According to him, vacant shuttles may be offered to new businesses in Baku.