Following adoption of restrictions during COVID-19 pandemic, passenger transports by train have declined by 40-50% when compared to the same period of 2019, Pasazieru vilciens board chairman Rodzers Janis Grigulis has declared.
Trains were half-empty in April, the situation was better in May and the number of passengers carried in June improved considerably.
Grigulis says passenger transport declines differ between lines. For examples, Jurmala line does not show any particularly good results, whereas Saulkrasti line shows very good results.
He adds the decline observed on short lines reaches 20% when compared to 2019.
According to the head of Pasazieru vilciens, one positive tendency is that people have started using public transport services again. The negative tendency is that some people do not use facemasks when using public transports.
As for safety during the spread of the virus, COVID-19 pandemic motivated Pasazieru vilciens to review train ticket booths and the number of cashiers to reduce the risk of face-to-face virus spread. He said during the state of emergency demand for electronic tickets had increased 4-fold. The next step would be introducing automated ticked machines.
“We are working on that. Soon we will unveil the first test models,” says Grigulis. (BNN/Business World Magazine)