EU – Baltic States, Good for Business, Tourism, Transport

The first departures on the Riga-Kaunas route are scheduled for June 5 and departures from Riga to Vilnius, Warsaw, Gdansk and Tallinn will resume on June 15.

Eurolines head Edmunds Pavlovs indicated that the company will restart its passenger service gradually. "At the beginning we will travel to Lithuania, from mid-June we will restart travel to Tallinn, Warsaw, Gdansk. Of course, we will be watching and evaluating the situation - each week is different now," Pavlovs said, adding that people want to travel and his need has not disappeared. 

Eurolines' representatives also noted that the resumption of passenger transportation to the previous levels will depend on other countries' decisions to reopen their borders. "People traveling to and from Scandinavia make up a large part of our passengers in the Baltic states. The more our neighbor countries renew opportunities to travel to other countries the higher the likelihood of travelers from Latvia start moving around too," said Pavlovs. 

The company's representatives underlined that as operations are resumed, increased attention will be paid to safety - the buses will be disinfected and aired after each trip and disinfectants will be available to passengers on the buses. Tickets will only be sold for every other seat to ensure a safe distance between passengers. Passengers' body temperature will be measured with contactless thermometers. 

Bus drivers will be using face masks and Euroline is urging its passengers to wear face masks during the trips. 

"Belarus and Ukraine are among our most popular routes to the East. Before the quarantine we had the biggest passenger flows in that direction. But we will only be able to restart these routes gradually as quarantine restrictions are eased. We hope very much that travel will be possible already in the summer," said Pavlovs. 

Eurolines, registered in 2017, has a share capital of EUR 14,700, according to information available at Firmas.lv. In 2018, Eurolines posted a loss of EUR 18,328 on a EUR 6,387 turnover.  

Lithuanian national Vytautas Valciukas is the sole owner of Eurolines.