Free ride for the readers!

The longest and one of the oldest tram routes in Kyiv, the route number 12, spans almost 20 kilometers from Pushcha Vodytsia to Kontraktova Square. An old Czech Tatra train needs about 1 hour and 10 minutes to ride through this distance, including the time spent on stops. It is a lot of time to read! From now on, reading in the public transport will have a positive impact not only on the mental activity, but also on the wallet. Winners of Kyivpastrans promotion, who take the best photos of themselves reading a book in a transportation vehicle, will be awarded October monthly tickets for three types of ground transportation.

The applicants are required to take a picture of themselves with a book in the trolley, bus, tram, funicular, or the city train. The picture should be uploaded to Facebook followed by the hashtag #ячитаюзкиївпастранс [I am reading with Kyivpastrans] and the link to facebook.com/Kyivpastrans. The promotion participants should also be subscribed to the Kyivpastrans page and open the access to the photo for everyone in their privacy settings. At the end of the month the organizers will use random.org service to single out five winners, each receiving a three-type monthly ticket. The promotion runs from September 1 to 27, the winners will be announced on September 28.

“It is the first time that we do such a promotion,” says Anna Bondar, Head of Marketing and Public Relations Department of Kyivpastrans. “We would like to see pictures of books or magazines on paper, not the electronic media. This way we are not only supporting the culture of reading, but also contributing to the preservation of a printed medium in our digital age.” In June, a similar promotion took place in the Romanian city of Cluj-Napoca, the local authorities of which backed up the activists’ proposal and declared a free ride for all reading passengers. The promotion lasted four days. “However, such a format is not available to us, because the law requires the fare to be set by the Kyiv administration, not by Kyivpastrans,” explains Bondar.