Skopje is due to get an integrated ticket, with the same piece of paper valid on both train and bus. Mayor Orce Gjorgjievski says the system, to be developed together with the Transport Ministry, should be ready by the middle of next year.

His explanation is more concrete than most announcements on this subject: "So that you don't get off the train having paid 40 denars, then board a bus and pay another 35. With one ticket you should be able to get on in Zelenikovo and travel to Gjorce Petrov."

40 plus 35 denars is the real cost

That sentence contains everything you need to know about the problem. A passenger coming in from Zelenikovo who has to continue across the city today pays 75 denars for a single one-way journey - because the system treats them as two different passengers. For somebody commuting daily, that is 150 denars a day, or around 3,000 denars a month purely for changing vehicles.

The integrated ticket is not an innovation. It is the standard in almost every European city with a railway running through its urban area. The question is not why now, but why only now.

BRT: tender in the coming days, construction in spring 2027

The bus rapid transit project is running in parallel. Gjorgjievski announced that the tender procedure for design and construction will be published within the next few days, in coordination with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. If the procedure runs to plan, construction work would begin towards the end of spring 2027.

The BRT is meant to connect Gjorce Petrov with Aerodrom, and the project provides for the purchase of 40 environmentally friendly buses and a frequency that would leave passengers waiting less than 6 minutes.

The mayor expects the whole project to become operational by the end of his term.

An announced project, not a service in operation

It is worth pausing on one detail easily lost in the enthusiasm: the integrated ticket is, for now, an announced project. There is no tariff model, no technological solution, no agreement between the City and the railway company. What is known is that it is wanted, and roughly when.

The people of Skopje know the difference between those two things by heart. The planned BRT deadline has already slipped once, and the start of construction has now been pushed to spring 2027. That does not mean it will not happen. It means the dates are worth exactly as much as the tender standing behind them.

If by the middle of next year a single ticket really does carry a person from Zelenikovo to Gjorce Petrov, it will be the biggest change in Skopje's public transport in a decade. Until then, 75 denars.