site.btaKulata-Petrich Train Service to Be Suspended Aug. 1 - Sept. 15

Trains running between Kulata and Petrich in the southwesternmost corner of Bulgaria will be temporarily suspended from August 1 to September 15, Deputy Transport Minister Lyuben Nanov told journalists on Monday in the village of Marikostinovo. He held a meeting with mayors of villages from Petrich Municipality, Sandanski Mayor Atanas Stoyanov, Petrich Deputy Mayor Minka Salagyorova and Petrich Municipal Council Chair Svetla Danailova. 

"We discussed all the details, the ways in which people will be transported, so we have an agreement," Nanov said after the meeting. He noted that the trains will be unavailable only temporarily, due to a general shortage of rolling stock in Bulgaria. "We need to reduce the number of trains in some areas in order to redirect train cars to places with more intense traffic," the deputy minister emphasized.

Nanov noted that the company which will transport passengers by bus along the train route will comply with the demands of the people. He noted that a second meeting is coming up, at which they will discuss in detail each settlement through which the buses will pass, the location of the bus stops and how many people will be transported daily.

On Thursday, mayors of settlements in Petrich Municipality threatened to block the Struma Motorway in order to protest a decision of the Bulgarian State Railways (BDZ) to temporarily replace passenger trains with bus transport in the area.

"We have assurances from the Deputy Minister and the Bulgarian Railways that all trains that are now being suspended and replaced by a bus service will run again after September 15", General Todorov Village Mayor Stanislav Stankov said, adding that the planned blockade of the motorway is cancelled for now. "We will give way slightly, but if a bus comes to the stations again on September 15, we will do the same," he pointed out. He noted that the price of a bus ticket will be the same as a train ticket.