Minibuses Inspected After Accident Rate Hike

By Irina Titova

Staff Writer

Published: March 21, 2008 (Issue # 1358)

A recent increase in the number of accidents involving the city’s marshrutki minibuses has prompted police, prosecutors and the city administration to step up safety inspections.

On Tuesday, an inspection of 18 marshrutki in northern St. Petersburg registered 14 violations of traffic rules, and three of the minibuses were taken off the route in question, Fontanka.ru reported.

The inspection showed that the vehicles were breaking technical safety standards.

However, experts say that the most frequent violation of traffic rules performed by drivers of marshrutki is making an illegal turn from the wrong lane, cutting across other vehicles and putting the safety of passengers at risk, according to Fontanka.ru.

Another common violation is that minibuses pick up and drop off passengers in illegal zones.

The city’s marshrutki also cause problems at bus stops near metro stations, which become crowded because they are often the final stop on the route. As a result, bus passengers have to step into the street in order to catch the bus they need.

Since the beginning of this year, six major traffic accidents involving marshrutki have been recorded, in which four people were killed and 30 injured.

During the first few days of this week in three separate incidents, marshrutki collided with trucks.

The latest accident took place on Tuesday when a marshrutka minibus collided with a truck while making a left turn toward the suburb of Pushkin on the Pulkovskoye Highway. Ten people were seriously injured in the accident and taken to hospital. The driver of the marshrutka did not yield to the truck, Gazeta.spb said.