Bus drivers strike over traffic light safety concerns

Bus drivers went on strike on Friday morning, complaining that the government has ignored concerns related to traffic lights fitted with cameras.

According to their trade unions, Omepege-Sek and Segdamelin-Peo, the drivers have warned that the speed at which traffic lights change colour, combined with the fact that the cameras will record violations and allow the authorities to issue fines for those who run red lights, has made driving buses unsafe.

This, they say, is because drivers are forced to brake suddenly when the lights change colour, “which creates serious safety issues for passengers”, who are in almost all cases either sat without seatbelts or stood up.

They said they have made “repeated … warnings to the transport ministry”, but that “no substantial solution has been provided to date”.

The strike lasted for two hours, with Ompege-Sek leader Charalambos Avgousti saying during the strike that drivers had asked for timers to be fitted to traffic lights so that drivers can see how much time remains before they will change colour.

He said that buses are “difficult to stop”, and stressed that his union is “not asking that drivers not be reported for violating the law, nor that their points be deleted”, but instead is “simply asking for a warning before the light turns red so [drivers] can stop more smoothly and the passengers on the bus are not at risk”.

“If there is no response, you understand that the next step will be to escalate measures,” he warned.

Segdamelin-Peo leader Natia Kyritsi, meanwhile, said that a total of 26 bus drivers have accumulated more than 18 penalty points on their licences. Drivers temporarily lose their licences after amassing 16 penalty points.

Her comments came after a representative of Limassol’s bus company Emel had said that 85 bus drivers are “on the verge” of losing their driving licences due to penalty points.

“We do not believe that in 2026, this is an issue which cannot be resolved. I think it is the political will which does not exist. We have been discussing this issue since February 2024, and the state has not been interested in resolving it,” Kyritsi said.

MPs had voted in 2024 to raise the threshold for licences to be suspended from 12 points to 16, but the government has remained steadfast in its opposition to the prospect of fitting timers to traffic lights, instead insisting on the existing smart lights and traffic cameras.

Transport Minister Alexis Vafeades had lambasted MPs who attempted to vote the fitting of timers into law, saying that those who voted in favour of the idea had not listened to the experts.

“When this was being discussed in the committee, we put our positions to it and experts also informed them of their positions. The MPs did not listen to the experts and in the end came to a different conclusion than the experts,” he said.

Asked about what the experts’ position was, he said that when countdown timers were installed at traffic lights in Poland, the number of deadly traffic accidents actually increased.

He also said that countdown timers may not be compatible with the existing smart traffic lights.

“The smart lights monitor the traffic situation and can go from turning green in 19 seconds to turning green in zero seconds immediately. If there was a visible timer, it would therefore flash from 19 to zero immediately, and this would obviously confuse drivers,” he said.

He added that a system combining smart traffic lights with a countdown timer “does not exist anywhere in the world”.