Travel Notes

AIRPORT ‘96

Passengers flying on FSU civil airlines were ten times as likely to die in a crash during the past five years vs. the five years previous. Rudolf Teimurazov, head of Russia’s Intergovernmental Aviation Commission Flight Safety Commission has said that 1,462 air travelers died in CIS civil air-related accidents from 1992-1996. In the previous five-year period, 477 persons died. Add to this the fact that air traffic has dropped dramatically over the same period, from 119 million passengers in 1987 to approximately 37.5 million in 1996. Teimurazov attributed the dramatic rise of air fatalities to a range of factors, including the wholesale deregulation of the airline industry, aging aircraft, the lack of adequate maintenance and overloading. Though the Russian Transport Ministry has said that passengers flying regularly scheduled flights have little to worry about, the US State Department strongly discourages American citizens from flying CIS carriers.

Foreign Drivers Targeted

The office of the Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov has formally confirmed that a crackdown on foreign drivers is in place, with the aim of tightening control over diplomats and other foreigners driving in the Russian capital. The mayor’s office said that the crackdown followed “increasingly gross violations of traffic rules by drivers of motor vehicles which belong to the diplomatic corps.” City authorities have also ordered a check on whether cars parked outside foreign embassies obstruct traffic or make it difficult to clean roads. In the last year, diplomatic cars were involved in 16 traffic incidents in which two persons were killed and 21 injured. Yet the crackdown is apparently in response to what Russia claims is harassment of its diplomats by New York City police.

Not April Fool’s

In many Russian cities and towns, a cheap ride can be had by merely flagging down the first passing vechicle, whether private car, off-duty ambulance, or even paddy wagon, and negotiate a fee. However, as of April 1, 1997, St. Petersburg will outlaw the use of this convenient form of transportation. Stiff fines await moonlighting chauffeurs, which means passengers will now have to hail one of the city’s 1,500 officially registered cabbies, who charge 2,000 rubles ($0.35) per kilometer. The city plans to deploy 2,000 plainclothes officers of the GAI (State Auto Inspectorate) to nab violators, who could reportedly be fined up to 30 million rubles ($5,300). The amount will increase drastically with each successive offense. Advisors to the city finance committee have complained that  enforcement will cost at least $300,000 a month — three times the revenue the new regulations are expected to yield.