"The tender for the breakthrough was announced yesterday. It seeks to buy about a third more kilometres of public transport running, which is 28.4 million kilometres on 54 routes served by almost 330 buses," Vilnius Mayor Valdas Benkunskas told reporters Wednesday.,
The routes are currently run by three operators: the municipality-owned Vilniaus viešasis transportas (VVT), private operators Transrevis and Kautra, with the municipality reimbursing the cost per kilometre.
"We are not buying buses or any infrastructure, we are buying a service. (...) It will be the responsibility of the operators to find manufacturers, (…) to hire drivers and to comply with the criteria set out in the contract that include qualitative parameters, keeping to the timetables and so on," the mayor said.
Nearly 630 public transport vehicles are currently running in Vilnius. After the tender, this number is scheduled to grow by 30% to 824 vehicles running a total of 67 million kilometres.
By 2030, 46 existing routes will be adjusted and 44 routes will be increased in frequency. There will be a significant expansion of routes in the part of the city where transport runs every 6 minutes. In those areas where public transport is very infrequent, the frequency is planned to be 15 minutes.
"After the tender, at the beginning of 2027-2028, we will start with a completely different quality in frequency," said Benkunskas.
Vilnius City expects to sign new contracts with bus operators in mid-summer 2025.