Eight bus lines in Bulgaria's capital city Sofia are to be re-routed, one is to be closed permanently, while intervals between buses are to be increased, Bulgarian news agency BTA said on September 24 2009.

The changes are needed because of the linking of the Sofia metro which now reaches from Sofia's furthermost eastern and western boroughs, linking Lyulin and Mladost with the Sofia city centre.

A working group set up under the aegis of Sofia transport company Metropoliten and the centre of Urban Mobility have hammered out a scheme whereby bus lines 3,4,5,76,88,94,111,113,213,214,306 and 413 will be changed.

"Optimisations plans" have been drawn up for trolleybus lines 5 and 8, or put simply, cars will run less frequently because of the expected reduction in the number of passengers.

Bus line 313 from Mladost 1 to Sofia central railway station will be discontinued, while bus line 280, known as the "student line" will be redirected from its current route to the Sofia University via Orlov Most. Instead, it will be shifted onto Evlogi and Hristo Georgievi Boulevard, to General D Nikolaev Boulevard, Stochna Gara and will then proceed to the Central Station.

One of the bus lines (284) linking the city with Sofia Airport, will be deviated from Terminal 2 towards Druzhba1 and then to Mladost 1.

Bus 305 from Tsarigradsko Chaussee will not go to Orlov Most as it currently does, but will be redirected towards the Romanian embassy, and from there through Poduyane and to the Central Station.

Metropoliten have not disclosed an official date when the changes will take effect. Some officials believe that there will be further changes, Dnevnik daily said, because the envisaged changes would mean that some passengers would end up paying twice as much for transportation than now, as there is no proposed direct bus link from Sofia Airport to Sofia city centre.

In theory at least, the new metro section linking Mladost and Lyulin is a welcomed by most Sofians because it will cut traffic congestion and give commuters a fast, comfortable and efficient means of transport. Experts believe that with the operation of the new metro line, the atmosphere will be spared more than 70 000 tons of carbon emissions annually.

Sofians will spend 50 000 hours daily less in traffic jams and congestion, while traffic along the Tsarigradsko Chaussee is expected to decrease by 14 per cent.