City Sets Up Night Buses To Follow Metro Routes

The night buses will only run on weekends and public holidays at first.

The St. Petersburg Times

Published: July 4, 2012 (Issue # 1716)

Five night bus routes were launched in St. Petersburg on July 1. The routes follow those of the metro system, which closes shortly after midnight, and are designed to fill the gap in public transport during the night.

The night buses will be marked with the letter M, and their numbers correspond to the number of the underground line along which they run: 1 M for the Red Line, 2 M for the Blue Line, 3 M for the Green Line, 4 M for the Yellow Line and 5 M for the Purple Line.

The buses are currently working in an experimental model, but are due to be launched properly on Saturday, July 7. For this purpose, 67 buses have been allocated by City Hall’s Transport Committee and the state enterprise Passazhiravtotrans, according to the Transport Committee.

The buses will run from 12 a.m. to 6 a.m. at 15-minute intervals on weekends and public holidays at first, and according to the press service of the Transport Committee, the routes may start operating every night if they prove popular.

The cost of travel is the same as daytime public buses: 23 rubles ($0.71) per ticket; travel passes are also valid on them. The night buses will stop at the regular bus stops used by daytime transport.

During the summer months when the bridges over the Neva River are raised and therefore closed to traffic, the night buses will take alternative routes without crossing the river, but when the bridges are closed, transportation across the Neva will be resumed.

A timetable for the night buses can be found at bus stop signs and on the Transport Committee website, and can also be seen online at the St. Petersburg Public Transport website: gov.spb.ru.