The doors opened without any announcement or apology — the driver simply told around thirty passengers to get off.
The scene was witnessed by chance by brothers Amer and Tarik Alić, owners of the neighbouring restaurant Cevabdzinica 10: they were sitting on the terrace when the bus braked right in front of their tables, even though it was scheduled to continue further along the route. The brothers filmed the moment: the driver standing on the pavement with a phone to his ear, while the former passengers silently made their way to the stop to wait for the next bus.
It’s worth noting that the X6 is not an ordinary line but a replacement route that MVG runs when regular service is temporarily suspended for repairs. Such shifts are traditionally harder on drivers than usual — due to longer hours and tighter schedules — and the operator itself acknowledges as much.
The driver’s explanation
When the Alić brothers asked what had happened, the answer was brief: he had been driving for nine hours straight, and no replacement driver could be found. Having said this, the driver walked off, leaving the bus in the middle of the road with its door still open, as if the route had simply broken off mid-sentence. For the next twenty minutes the abandoned vehicle sat where it was, until an MVG employee arrived and moved it aside.
The figure the driver gave — nine hours — comes close to the maximum permitted driving time for professional drivers in the European Union. And because such data is recorded by the bus’s onboard system, his account was later easy to verify.
The operator’s response
When reporters contacted MVG for an explanation of the unusual incident, the company did not deny what had happened but confirmed it without hesitation. MVG spokesman Maximilian Kaltner acknowledged that the inconvenience to passengers was regrettable. But he added the key point — no violation had been found in the driver’s conduct. (Seriously? — Ed.)
According to MVG’s account, events unfolded as follows: the driver judged that continuing was unsafe, let the passengers off near the next stop, and only then parked the bus. Kaltner stressed that no breach of driving or rest-time regulations had been recorded — this data is logged by the onboard system and can be checked. The fatigue the driver mentioned was his own personal assessment of the moment, not the result of overtime.
In other words, has the operator forgotten that bus drivers are not permitted to stop, let alone drop off or pick up passengers, outside designated bus stops? That this is arguably less safe than working overtime. — Ed.
MVG’s position on the matter
The operator’s position here is a matter of principle. Work on replacement routes already carries a heavier workload, and if an employee feels he has reached his limit, the company expects exactly that response from him — up to and including halting the route.
A drivers’ work schedule is the concern of the company and its management, not of the passengers! If management at the company cannot handle its responsibilities, perhaps MVG’s leadership needs replacing. Even bad dancers eventually run out of room to blame the floor… — Ed.
MVG regards the decision to stop the route when in doubt about one’s own capacity not as a failure but as an act of responsibility, even at the cost of inconvenience to passengers.
The remaining hundred metres to the intended stop were, in the company’s view, manageable on foot, and so no grounds for compensation were found. The episode, which spread thanks to a chance video from onlookers, looks routine to the operator: not a breakdown in the transport system, but the ordinary response of a tired person to a borderline situation.
Our editorial team very much hopes that the affected passengers will bring a class action that leads to serious consequences for the company — and above all for employees who refuse to acknowledge their own fault and instead shift the blame onto passengers.
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