The week started on May 13 with “Rīgas satiksme” Board participating in the meeting of creditors with the leadership of Riga City Council (O. Burovs, V. Baraņņiks). No further information about the meeting and its agenda will be provided. It was also agreed that the next meeting with creditors would be held on June 17, when “Rīgas satiksme” Council members will be introduced to the creditors.

On May 14, RP SIA “Rīgas satiksme” Chairman of the Board Dr. iur. E. Saulītis and head of the Infrastructure Maintenance and Development Section  I. Vindberga met with representatives of the Riga City Council Property Department to discuss real estate objects to be invested in the company’s fixed capital. Seven objects were recognized as suitable for investing from those prepared; therefore “Rīgas satiksme” will ask the Riga City Council Property Department to prepare a necessary draft resolution of the City council. A part of the objects to be invested is already being used in the commercial operations of the company for purposes of maintenance of buildings and transport infrastructure.

On May 14, “Rīgas satiksme” Board member J. Meirāns met with leading specialists of the Procurement Monitoring Bureau to discuss issues related to furthering competition in the field of parking service payments. Now there are several players on this market, including SIA “Rīgas karte”, which is a subsidiary of “Rīgas satiksme”, and SIA “Mobilly”. It is planned to organize a procurement to increase the number of service providers in this field.

On May 15 and 16, a group of experts worked intensively on accepting the vehicles from “Škoda Transportation/Škoda Electric”. The group of experts has reached an agreement with the Czechs that they will finish the preparation of the technical documentation and will submit it by May 24. “Rīgas satiksme” will have one week to accept it, after which representatives of the company will go to Plzen, where they will test and accept on June 3-10 the vehicles to be delivered, before approving the delivery schedule.

On May 15, the Board of “Rīgas satiksme” met with the holder of the company’s capital shares, V. Baraņņiks, and discussed topical issues. Following a request of V. Faļkovs, the Chairman of the Communication and Transport Committee, “Rīgas satiksme” will submit proposals how to improve public trabsport traffic to Vakarbuļļi beach in the summer season shortly.

On May 16, the Board of “Rīgas satiksme” held another meeting to discuss several issues. The Board has approved the company’s stand on the complaint against the decision of the Competition Council in the so called “Nano-water case”. The Board also agreed to revise its earlier decision to stop designing activities in stages 1 and 2 of the Skanste tramline project (the new part of the tramline) and given the signs that necessary funding may be found to continue the designing activities, it was decided to suspend the designing activities so that they could be resumed immediately when the necessary preconditions will be in place. The Board also decided to update investment projects and to harmonize the activities already scheduled for this year with the available funding and the planned building season. The projects are due to be updated until the end of May, which will be a responsibility of two Board members, A. Krūze and J. Švanders. In addition, the Board also decided to support the appointment of J. Meirāns to the position of the marketing director in SIA “Rīgas karte”, as provided for by the agreement with its shareholders. J. Meirāns will be able to take on this position after being accepted at the meeting of SIA “Rīgas karte” shareholders, as well as after receiving a consent from the holder of “Rīgas satiksme” capital shares for the combination of the two positions. J. Meirāns will not receive any salary from the capital society for this job, like for fulfilling the duties of SIA “Rīgas karte” Board member.

On May 17, shareholders of “Rīgas satiksme” held a meeting and considered several issues related with amendments to authorisation agreements and other agreements of the Board members.

Unfortunately, the annual report of “Rīgas satiksme” was not approved at this meeting and its approval was postponed to next week. “Rīgas satiksme” Board member J. Švanders, who is in charge of financial matters, and Financial Director L. Hodasēviča continued to harmonize positions with the auditor of the annual report. The annual report of “Rīgas satiksme” is an important element of the consolidated annual report of Riga municipality, and its approval is a priority now.

The week concluded with an event having a significant impact on commercial operations of “Rīgas satiksme”. Following the order of Acting Deputy Chairman of Riga City Council O. Burovs, the traffic of tram No. 11 was closed, because it was established during the repair that the technical condition of the supporting structure of Brasa viaduct is even worse than predicted before. As of Saturday, passengers on this route are carried by bus No. 11T, and solutions are being searched to resume safe traffic of trams on this route. “Rīgas satiksme” apologizes to all the passengers who waited for the trains in vain on May 17 because of the lack of information.

To improve access to information about the arrival time of the necessary public transport and its location, it is planned to develop an application for smart devices with the proper functionality. “Rīgas satiksme” hopes that it will be useful to clients and will successfully replace information boards where the installation of such boards is unfeasible economically or technically.