Salzburg trolleybuses can deal with slippery situations, but not with unreasonable politics

During now more than 80 years of sucessfull performance with Salzburg trolleybuses, there again and again were some slippery situations with the danger of reducing or even closing the system. Some lobbyists are not interested in a well operated trolleybus system which is an example for this environmentally friendly form of future modern public transport.

At the beginning of 2022 some important politicians of the ruling Salzburg`s city conservative party presented the idear to organice Salzburg`s transport system new by using suburban or interurban motorbuses for urban transport too instead of todays trolleybuses. There was the idea to close in a first step trolleybuslines 8 and 10 and turn them to motorbus operation and to reduce trolleybusnetwork by closing some sections of line 2 and 5.

This idea caused protest from all (!) other partys and of many citizens – published in the Salzburg newspapers. The even conservative provincial councilor for public transport decided after all the protest, that no trolleybus line should be closed.

It seems that this slippery situation for Salzburg trolleybuses is over but all citicens have to stay alert!

In February 2022 after all the dicussions there were good news – Salzburg ordered 13 further Hess/ABB articulated trolleybuses bringing the Hess fleet to 42 vehicles, being delivered in 2023 and 2024.

So the future speeks „trolleybus“ and therefor Salzburg brandnew trolleybus 427 (Hess/ABB,2022) was tested in Innsbruck and the capital city of Lower Austria St.Pölten is thinking about a new trolleybus system ...

Gunter Mackinger