Public transport in Debrecen

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Public transport in Debrecen is provided by two companies, DKV and Hajdú Volán. Trams and trolleybuses are operated by DKV (short for Debreceni Közlekedési Vállalat – Public Transport Company of Debrecen; complete name is DKV Rt.) while buses are operated by Hajdú Volán, which also provides transport in the rest of Hajdú-Bihar county.

1 DKV
- 1.1 Trams and trolleys
2 Hajdú Volán
3 Fares
4 External links

[edit] DKV

The famous "blue tram"

The company was founded in 1883 under the name Debrecen Local Tramway Company. They started providing public transport on October 2, 1884 with horse-drawn and steam-powered trams. The first electric tram started operating in 1911. From 1906 the town of Hajdúsámson and later, the town of Nyírbátor were connected to Debrecen by municipal railway, also operated by the same company.

By the 1940s there were already ten tram lines. On June 2, 1944 the city was bombed, and the tramway system was seriously damaged. They were repaired by 1947, and seven tram lines were serving the city until the 1970s, which brought a decrease in the popularity of trams. Tramways were demolished all over the country, the role of trams was taken over by buses. Today Debrecen is one of only four Hungarian cities to have a tram line, but even here only one line survived, the rest were demolished. The importance of DKV decreased, the company lost its leading role in the public transport of Debrecen.

Trolleybuses started operating in 1985, several of them serves on lines which used to be tram lines before the 1970s.

The company became state property on July 15, 1950. Today it is city property.

[edit] Trams and trolleys

Ganz-Solaris type low-floor trolley.

Between 1970 and 1984 21 FVV trams entered service. The same tram type was used in Budapest, Miskolc and Szeged, trams for the latter two cities were built by DKV. The company still owns eight of them, but they can rarely be seen on the streets.

The typical blue trams (KCSV-1S) of Debrecen were built in 1993. There are only 11 of them in the whole world, all of them in Debrecen.

The company also owns an old nostalgia tram.

The trolleybuses ZiU-9 were manufactured in the Soviet Union, 26 of them entered service since 1985. The four articulated trolleybuses have been in use since 1991. New Solaris Trollino buses are being bought since April 2005, in place of the old Soviet buses.

[edit] Hajdú Volán

Hajdú Volán is one of the legal successors of MÁVAUT, a company founded in 1949 to provide mass transport all over the country. The company provides local public transport in Debrecen and four other towns. It owns 350 buses, about 170 of them serve on the 50 bus lines of Debrecen.

[edit] Fares

[edit] Tickets

Ticket: 180 Ft
Ticket (when bought on vehicle): 215
Ticket for all tram and trolley bus lines, valid for 1 day: 500 Ft
Ticket for all bus, tram and trolley bus lines, valid for 1 day: 800 Ft

[edit] Season tickets (valid for one month)

Tram & trolleybus season ticket: 2.240 Ft
Bus, tram & trolleybus season ticket: 4.550 Ft
Tram & trolleybus season ticket for students and pensioners: 890 Ft
Bus, tram & trolleybus season ticket for students and pensioners: 2.080 Ft

[edit] Season tickets (other)

Tram & trolleybus season ticket for one week: 896 Ft
Bus, tram & trolleybus season ticket for one week: 1.820 Ft
Tram & trolleybus season ticket for two weeks: 1.344 Ft
Bus, tram & trolleybus season ticket for two weeks: 2.730 Ft
Bus, tram & trolleybus season ticket for students & pensioners for 3 months: 6.240 Ft

Traveling is free for children under 6, blind persons, Hungarian citizens above 65, Hungarians from neighbouring countries, war invalids, war widows, members of parliament.