Bus fares to be cut next week

Written by Writer on Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008

PUBLIC TRANSPORT

Bus fares to be cut next week

AMORNRAT MAHITTHIROOK
Bangkok Post
Wednesday October 22, 2008

Bangkok bus fares will be cut by 1-1.50 baht and those of inter-provincial buses by 3 satang per kilometre from Tuesday.

Chalor Kotcharat, chairman of the central land transport committee, said fares will be reduced from 10 to 8.50 baht on white-blue buses, from 9 to 7.50 baht on cream-red buses, and from 8 to 7 baht on green minibuses.

Air-conditioned bus fares will be lowered by one baht. Fares will be between 12-23 baht for white-blue buses and 13-25 baht for Euro II buses.

Song thaew passenger truck fares will also be cut from 7.50 to 6 baht in Bangkok.

Fares of inter-provincial buses run by the state-owned Transport Co and its concessionaires will come down by 3 satang per kilometre.

The new fares are based on a diesel price of about 25 baht a litre as PTT Plc, the country’s largest energy company, expects the diesel price to stay at this level for a while. Diesel retailed at about 24 baht a litre yesterday.

Transport authorities agree with the proposal by bus operators that they introduce a standard scale for bus fares that matches fluctuations in the diesel price for convenient fare changes.

Chairat Sa-nguansue, director-general of the Land Transport Department, said his agency hired the King Mongkut Institute of Technology Ladkrabang to work out the fare scale. Transport authorities would decide whether fares should change whenever the diesel price moved by 2.50 or 3 baht per litre.

Mr Chalor, who is also the director-general of the Marine Department, said officials would finalise fare changes for passenger boats in a few days.

Chumpol Sampaopol, director of the traffic and transport office of the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration, said yesterday that motorcycle taxi fares would stay the same as motorcycle taxi drivers had been asked to freeze their fares in the past when diesel prices rose.