Two weeks, two countries, two
seasons. Kazakhstan
& Kyrgyzstan 2018.
A new
Iveco Hybrid emerges from the underpass in front of the opera house in Astana.
Work on designing
Astana started just after independence in 1991, utilising the vast sparsely
populated Central Steppes to replace the former crowded capital Almaty which is
located in the south of the country. Despite being devoid of hills and having
only one major river, the geology makes the city unsuitable for a subway and so
the public transport network is solely reliant upon buses, although a monorail
between the airport and railway station is currently under construction.
The
only sighting of a bus in Astana not in corporate livery. There was no
identifying operator name, chassis type or body manufacturer.
The oddly named 'Astana
LRT' is responsible for 1,000 buses operating on 71 bus routes. Since 2014 the
City has invested heavily in new buses and supporting infrastructure with aid
from international banks. 214 buses were delivered in July 2015 followed by
several hundred in the following three years. Much of the recent investment was
linked to the international Expo17 held in the city during the summer of 2017.
Iveco was appointed official
supplier for Expo17 having already established a presence in the city by
supplying 358 Citelis Euro V buses. In time for the Expo, 210 Urbanway and
Urbanway Hybrids were delivered
from the factory in Annonay, France, while the final assembly was carried out locally in
Kostanay, at facilities belonging to Iveco Bus’s partner and distributor
SaryarkaAutoProm.
An Astana Iveco Citelis, one of the deliveries for Expo 2017.
Support
infrastructure also saw investment - a new depot, improved bus stops and travel
cards have all been implemented. The city has 1065 bus stops, 82 of the busiest
were upgraded to semi-enclosed with Wi-Fi connectivity and heating, essential
when temperatures can plummet to -20 combined with heavy snow fall. In July
2018 new
enter-and-exit rules began, boarding via the front door, exiting via any
door and cash fares became double the
amount charged using the 'Transcard' smartcard system, currently a single fare using the
card cost 90 tenge (approx US $0.26).
Astana City Tours, Higer KLQ6119GS.
Almaty
Set around a
dramatic backdrop of the Zailiysky Alatau mountains, the former capital Almaty is
the
largest city in Kazakhstan ,
with a population of 2,029,800. The city is comprised of beautiful tree lined
avenues in a grid formation, fed by a modern motorway network that brings
people in from the surrounding plains and also leads to chronic traffic
congestion. The public transport system consists of one subway route with 9
stations, 8 trolleybus routes and 110 bus routes. Bus routes are numbered 1 to 205 with route 3
operating 24hr from the airport, whilst trolleybus routes are numbered 1 to 25.
An
overloaded PAZ-320302-11-CNG
climbs Dostyk Avenue
on route 5.
In the late 1990s public transport
passed to 48 private operators operating 3,304 buses. Today that figure is 13 private companies and 1 municipal operator, Almaty Electrotrans,
together operating 1,535 buses and 200 trolleybuses. Approximately 800 of the
buses are CNG powered, some converted from diesel other purchased new. 2010/11
saw 200 new CNG deliveries with further deliveries from Daewoo (GDW6126HGNE model) and Yutong
(ZK6120HGM model) in subsequent years. The trolleybus network has also seen
regular investment although it has currently stalled, and there are 200 modern
Neoplan YoungMan JNP6120GDZ operating which have all been delivered since 2008.
Trolleybus
3013, a Neoplan Youngman JNP6120GDZ, sits at the central market on a late
Sunday afternoon.
Once again a smartcard, the 'Onay', is available reducing the fare from
150 tenge cash to 80 tenge. Surprisingly, conductors are still used on some
services and they carry a hand held scanner to supplement the one fitted beside
the driver cab. If time only permits just one bus journey, it is worth hopping
on a number 12, with a peak-time headway of seven minutes, departing from the
Kazakhstan Hotel in the city centre and climbing 899m in 14.5km through the
city's most affluent suburbs to the terminus at Medeu. This is the world’s
largest high mountain ice skating rink and is the gateway into the Shymbulak
Ski Resort, passing through the city's most affluent suburbs on route.
A Russian built
GAZ LiAZ 5292 laying over at the Medeu ice stadium, the terminus of route 12,
having climbed 899m in 14.5km from the city centre.
Before heading to either Sairan or Sayakhat, the two bus stations with
inter-regional departures, it is worth reflecting on Almaty's prominence in the
local bus building industry. In 2007 Daewoo Bus Kazakhstan LLP opened a factory
and 2019 production is expected to be between 300 and 400 units. 2016 saw the
launch by Higer and Parasat of a project for producing electric buses and in 2018
Euracom Group GmbH opened a facility that can build 100 electric buses per
year.
Attempting to
attract city sightseeing passengers at Medeu ice stadium is an 18m Eurabus from
German manufacturer Euracom Group. Euracom has built a factory in Almaty to
assemble upwards of 100 vehicles a year from German kits. The 18m articulated
version has a theoretical range of 650km.
Shymkent
This is third most populous city in Kazakhstan after Almaty and Astana
with a population of 1,002,291.The city has aspirations to attract more tourists
whilst continuing to develop as a regional centre. Two double-deck tourist
buses were delivered in 2015, purchased by Zhibek Zholy, but to outsiders there
seems little to attract visitors beyond a Soviet era centre and Kazak
modernism, although they do have a liking for all things London red like buses, phone boxes etc.
Coming
out of the early morning gloom in
Shymkent are Green Bus Company Golden Dragon YC6G260N-30
CNG and a Zhengzhou
Yutong also CNG powered.The city has 74 bus routes with a vast array of express services operated by 27 companies, including an international route to
One of the few
older buses operating in Shymkent is this MAN on Respublika Avenue, route 26.
The reason for staying in Shymkent is to use the city as a gateway for
visiting the historical sites at Otrar and Turkistan (a city not another
country despite its name), both are points along the original Silk
Road , about 2 1/2 hours and 600 tenge drive away. Turkistan has a modest bus terminus in the city centre
with local operators using a motley selection of Mercedes Benz 0405s, Russian
PAZ, Chinese FAW and van derived marshrutkas.
These
small yellow and white minibuses can be found on many Shymkent bus routes.
Whilst there is no manufacturer’s name, the grill badge does resemble Chinese
manufacturer Liao Ning.
Departing Kazakhstan
for Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan , the journey is best made by air due to the
state of the roads.
Bishkek
Arriving in the capital,
it becomes immediately apparent that the country is less developed than Kazakhstan . The
city has an older more established Soviet feel to it which is enhanced by the
aging fleet of trolleybuses plying the streets. There are 11 bus, 8 trolleybus
and 115 marshrutkas routes with bus fares costing eight som and marshrutkas ten som. (approx US
$0.14).
Bishkek
trolleybus 1603, a 2008
Belkommunmash AKSM-321, on Moskovskaya
Street.
A Chongqing
Hengtong CKZ6116NA4 CNG powered bus on Bishkek city route 35 laying over at the
central railway station.
In 2018 the city
created one transport body under local government control with the aim of
speeding up the modernisation of the network which had commenced in 2013 with
the arrival of forty-four new trolleybuses. Trolleybus deliveries have come
from Belkommunmash OJSC in Belarus and Russian
manufacturer Trolza (formally Ziu) who are the current favoured suppliers with
fifty-two 5275.03 Optima's due in service by the end
of 2019. Work to modernise the marshrutkas network has also taken place,
removing many of the older Mercedes Benz 207D's from the streets with
replacements between 2009 and 2013, via China Aid, coming from Yangzhou
Yaxing Motor Coach Co., Ltd.(now Asiastar). More recent deliveries in 2017 were Chinese
built Chongqing Hengtong CKZ6116NA4 CNG powered buses for city centre circular route
35 which also serves the railway station.
On route to the
Chinese border, the Issyk-Kul area is home to
many Uighurs peoples, and in a typical town the marshrutkas gather in the bus
terminus.
Moving on from the city to experience the natural wonders of this
country is relatively simple as the country has an extensive network of
marshrutkus routes. This mode of transport does however require stamina and one
long day in what was a Mercedes Benz Sprinter van conversion with upright seats
was more than enough on this holiday. Thankfully there are tourist coaches and
these tend to be old Setra's with the occasional Mercedes Benz and are well
suited to the rough roads. Heading east there is little in the way of major
conurbations after Tokmok, and major tourist destinations such as Issyk Kul, the
world’s second largest alpine lake and the ski resorts around the regional capital of Karakol are
mainly catered for by the dreaded white minibuses.
Neoplan Cityliner N116 on Intourist transfer
duties at Bishkek airport.
The easy option for the homeward journey was a flight back to Astana,
where the temperature had gone from a barmy summer 26° to a wintery -2° with a
blizzard blowing. Perhaps the weather is a good analogy for the transport in
these two countries. Kazakhstan
is enjoying an early summer of new buses and modern route systems whilst Kyrgyzstan is still emerging from a long soviet winter
with lack of resources to invest in a modern transport network.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/R2PqeteC2giRGfNd9
https://photos.app.goo.gl/R2PqeteC2giRGfNd9