And it began with the fact that the door of the institution was torn off and anyone who went there was visible from all sides. An alternative to a booth with a hole in the floor was a toilet in a nearby cafe, but the owners rented it out only for money. And the cafe is only open until five in the afternoon. As a result, many drivers began to use a rim instead of a door for protection from the wind and prying eyes.
Meanwhile, a whole battle unfolded in the bureaucratic offices on this occasion. City officials flatly refused to put in a door or replace the entire structure with a more comfortable one. “The bath is located on the territory of the Novosibirsk region of the Novosibirsk region, which means that the district authorities should deal with its replacement, and not with us,” the city administration explained. “No, excuse me, since the land under the toilet is federal property, the district cannot invest in repairing facilities on this territory; they can be jailed for embezzlement, so that is certainly not our concern,” said the district administration. denied The dispute dragged on, in government agencies confidence grew that the fate of the ill-fated cabinet should be decided by the federal government.
Confidence matured in the cabinets that Moscow should decide the issue
The situation with the lack of common areas, by the way, is typical for Novosibirsk. A few months ago, at the end of another route, on the Klyuch-Kamyshensky plateau, a trading pavilion was demolished where drivers and drivers used to go to the toilet. As a result, they have to run into the bushes. And another bus terminal is located next to the cemetery, there is nothing else around. The drivers between the graves eat and rest. Well everything else.
Half a year of fierce battles around a roadside toilet ended unexpectedly. The deputy of the City Council Svetlana Kaverzina intervened in the situation. Who did she deal with there, how much did she pay who? There is a big secret, but in the end the establishment had a door, and at the same time she washed and treated with an antiseptic. About what the deputy has there and then reported to the voters.
The deputy wrote on social networks that a door was finally placed in the bathroom. Where they laughed at her. Photo: Social networks
The report only made the audience laugh: “Why without a tape and without an orchestra?” The media went to compete in sarcasm: the deputy reported on the repair of a wooden toilet! Not so long ago, it was like a joke in the city that the Irkutsk people’s authorities opened a water pump with pomp, and the deputy governor took part in the solemn ceremony! And here she is from the same series: she found a deputy, she is powerful, something to be proud of. Also, the toilet hasn’t undergone any magical changes…
“Is this a joke?” – asks Kaverzina on social networks. “That’s life,” she replies.
Of course, it would be nice if city bus drivers had something other than a normal bathroom. They need a place to rest, because there are breaks between flights of three or four hours. Microwave to heat food. TV – in general, the last dream.
But there is no money in the city budget for the life of the driver. To be clear, let’s deviate from the toilet a bit. In November, as usual, winter came to Siberia. It’s snowing. The city prosecutor’s office, which has long been striving to put things in order with snow removal in Novosibirsk, took to the streets almost before the road builders. 40 violations were registered. Snow removal is still bad. Why? The answer is traditional: no equipment, no money to buy it. The prosecutor’s office appealed to the court and now, according to their decision, the mayor’s office must buy 650 (!) Snowplows. And this is 4.5 billion rubles. It is not clear where to get them, but I’m not even talking about it: how could such a shortage of equipment accumulate so that billions were needed to eliminate them? Chronic lack of funding, and this is in the area for which the mayor’s office is desperately beaten by the control authorities, not to mention the flow of complaints from citizens. And where, you ask, are the toilets for drivers? “Annually, the budget allocates 10 million rubles for the development of terminal stops,” says Svetlana Kaverzina. “And every year these millions are spent on other projects.”
But there are also businessmen, why don’t the authorities involve them in solving the problem? For many years, Novosibirsk has been trying to implement the concept of “smart” stops. There is enough mind to ensure that there are bathrooms at the final stops of the project. But the project is a project… In 2021, no one came to the auction, where 250 “smart” stops were offered to the dealer for 368 million rubles. Since then, the concept has been simplified. Shutdowns in the project are less and less “smart”. But no one has yet been found who wants to build them, not even with trading “blocks” (stalls). The last option is on the verge of despair. Entrepreneurs were offered to equip 34 final stops with dry closets for 1.4 million rubles. And also serve them. What is the benefit here, will the toilets for drivers be paid? But the contract, judging by the public procurement website, was concluded with the only organization that wanted to participate in the competition.
PS The negative of this general mess spilled out mainly on Kaverzina, and don’t show us that! “Everything is fragrant for us,” Vladimir Gorodetsky, now a senator and former mayor of Novosibirsk, used to say. We are ready to agree with him, right?
