Let's find out how to travel: why the authorities won't lower the age of bus drivers

The regions are trying to close the shortage of public transport drivers, Izvestia found out. For example, the Legislative Assembly of the Nizhny Novgorod region appealed to the government with a proposal to reduce the age limit for bus drivers from 21 to 19 years. However, this proposal was not supported by the Ministry of Transport and the Ministry of Education. About why the average age of drivers continues to rise and what solutions there may be to the shortage of personnel, see the Izvestia article.

Shortage of personnel in the field of transport

The Legislative Assembly of the Nizhny Novgorod Region proposed to the government of the Russian Federation to change the age for driving vehicles of categories D and DE, which are necessary for driving buses (the letter is available to Izvestia). This is how the region is trying to overcome the personnel shortage in this area.

Now the age threshold for this category of driving is 21 years old, the Nizhny Novgorod authorities propose to lower it to 19 years. They also asked to develop a state standard for secondary vocational education in the profession of Bus driver. It is assumed that young people who have completed their college studies as part of the targeted recruitment process will then work for three years in public transport.

The average age of public transport drivers today exceeds 50 years. The shortage of personnel is reflected in a reduction in the number of regular routes and an increase in traffic intervals, Anna Zudina, a researcher at the HSE Labor Research Center, told Izvestia.

"The situation continues to worsen due to the retirement of drivers and their transition to related fields," she said. — Job seekers are increasingly choosing to work in delivery rather than become bus drivers. As a result, the public transport sector is one of those industries where there is a large shortage of labor at the moment — the demand for specialists is high, and the number of vacancies is growing.

The expert noted that the influx of young people into the public transport sector is really difficult: this job is not considered prestigious, despite the fairly high level of salaries offered and their average annual growth. In addition, working in transport is perceived as difficult.

Applicants are also deterred by the need to upgrade their driving skills to categories D and DE at their own expense, said Anna Zudina.

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How bus drivers are trained

Today, in order to become a public transport driver, you need to study at a driving school and pass an exam for obtaining a license of the appropriate category.

The Ministry of Transport told Izvestia that they had responded to the authorities of the Nizhny Novgorod region, but did not disclose any details. However, the Ministry of Transport of the region said that the federal center considered that "there are now enough options for driver training."

And the Ministry of Education told Izvestia that obtaining specialized education for bus drivers is not mandatory, therefore, the development of an educational standard is impossible. However, the Ministry has developed exemplary professional retraining programs for drivers to improve their driving skills.

In colleges, citizens can learn the profession of a bus driver, provided that the organization providing professional training for such drivers has a license for educational activities, the ministry stressed.

In addition, lowering the age of drivers from 21 to 19 years old should be carefully considered to ensure road safety, according to the Ministry of Transport.

"According to the federal law on Road Safety, driving vehicles classified in categories D and DE requires not only professional skills, but also developed psychophysiological skills," the ministry explained to Izvestia.

How other regions are trying to overcome the deficit

Izvestia checked how other regions are trying to attract drivers to public transport. So, in Krasnodar, such employees are promised trips to a recreation center. And in Yaroslavl, they promise guaranteed employment to students of driving schools who pass their category D license.

In Perm, in September 2025, in order to solve the shortage of personnel, public transport drivers will receive higher salaries, Deputy head of the region Dmitry Galikhanov said in the fall of 2025 during a plenary session of the Perm City Duma. Employees are also being trained at the expense of enterprises, the social package is being expanded and professional skills competitions with a cash fee are being held.

And according to the Avito Rabota recruitment service, over the past year alone, the average salary offered for passenger transport drivers has increased by 27%.

The shortage of personnel is primarily due to low wages and difficult working conditions, Sergey Khrapach, a member of the Public Council under the Ministry of Transport and Road Infrastructure of the Moscow Region, co-chairman and board member of the Union of the Association of Road Carriers and Entrepreneurs "Regions", confirmed to Izvestia.

According to him, the situation is aggravated by the strong responsibility that public transport drivers experience when transporting passengers. Due to low salaries, drivers are forced to overwork to feed their families.

— Mostly people who have nowhere else to go go into the profession, — says the expert.

According to him, a significant increase in wages and an improvement in working conditions can eliminate the problem. Among other things, tax incentives for transport companies and preferential leasing programs will help.

— In urban routes, it is now not mandatory to have a cartographer, a device that monitors the driver's work and rest hours and ensures that the driver does not overstay at the wheel, — the expert emphasized.

Experts of the Popular Front in 2023 noted that even the emergence of new equipment leads to an acute shortage of personnel — due to the massive renovation of the fleet, a significant increase in staff is required.

"The problem will grow. At least 19 regions have already recognized a serious shortage of drivers when purchasing new vehicles and introducing new routes. There are cases of downtime of new buses, trams and trolleybuses due to the lack of drivers in Ulyanovsk, Petrozavodsk, Yekaterinburg, Novokuznetsk, Rostov-on-Don and other cities," the head of the Popular Front noted at the time. Analytics" by Olga Pozdnyakova.

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Will self-driving vehicles help

A possible solution may be the development of updated training programs for personnel training and retraining, as well as the development of safe unmanned vehicles, Anna Zudina believes.

"The latter will eventually make public transport available around the clock," she said.

Full autonomy of public transport is a promising idea, other experts told Izvestia. Such transport has a number of advantages — it is safe and can provide high-quality passenger service, said Maxim Piryazev, director of the Advanced School of Engineering Design.

However, experts predict its full implementation in Russia in decades.

— The transition may take from 10 to 20 years, as it will take considerable time to create the necessary infrastructure, adapt regulations and increase user confidence in new technologies, — said Maxim Piryazev.

In large agglomerations, the share of unmanned trams and shuttles may become noticeable in the next 10-15 years, added Dmitry Evdokimov, a researcher at the Research Center for Spatial Analysis and Regional Diagnostics at the Institute of Applied Economic Research of the Presidential Academy.

"But widespread abandonment of drivers will depend on the maturity of technology, infrastructure, regulation and the level of public trust," he said.

In the next five to seven years, the growth of unmanned transportation will be observed in major Russian cities such as Moscow and Kazan, agreed Andrey Keller, dean of the Transport Faculty of Moscow Polytechnic University. He also suggested that by 2030-2035, unmanned passenger transportation will become the standard for new urban mobility projects and an important part of the transport fleet of large cities.

"Russia is not only preparing for an unmanned future, but is also actively shaping it," he said. — We are at the forefront of technology, and unmanned public transport is not a fantasy, but the inevitable next stage in the development of safe, efficient and affordable urban mobility.

Currently, the introduction of unmanned vehicles follows a conservative model: limited routes, low speeds, the presence of an engineer or an observer driver, Dmitry Evdokimov said.

"Research and international experience show that with this mode, autonomous transport can reduce some of the typical accidents, but it is not yet possible to completely replace human control, so the key focus is on phasing and strict regulation," he said.

Russia has already created software and hardware complexes for unmanned vehicles, which are successfully being tested in difficult weather conditions.

— Unmanned taxis have been tested on the roads of the capital for the past few years, an unmanned shuttle (electric bus) is being tested in Innopolis, — said Andrey Keller, — In September of this year, Russia's first unmanned tram was launched in Moscow. And by the end of 2026, a test sample of an autonomous metro train will start running underground.

So far, these technologies are in the pilot stage, and the bulk of transportation is still carried out by people. But the use of unmanned control in public transport is planned to be expanded, the Ministry of Transport told Izvestia.

— The safety of passengers remains the main priority. All unmanned solutions are being thoroughly tested in an experimental mode," the ministry added.

The Ministry of Transport and the Moscow government are currently working on a federal law that will create a legal framework for the introduction of unmanned technologies in the transport sector, the ministry said.