First of all, let me congratulate all of you – website and facebook page visitors – with our one-year birthday!
The first entry in the website appeared on April 25, 2013, and the first entry on the facebook page on May 10, 2013. Over this year, there were a few dozen articles posted in the website and a few hundred posts in the facebook page. It so happened that the website contains only the most important and most relevant information, particularly in relation to public transport in Vilnius while facebook page also contains the news about the trolleybuses around the world, related photos, videos and more.
Of course we are not posting all the information about all our actions or future plans. Some things may be boring and irrelevant to our readers. Some plans of our actions are not revealed on public as, sadly, we have not only friends but also enemies, who are trying to pre-empt and disrupt our actions and initiatives.
The goal of Movement “Trolleybuses in Vilnius” is not only the aim to promote public transport and to make it better. Our goal is distribution of fair information and aim that people think and form their own opinion, their own conclusions themselves. We do not “copy-paste” press releases distributed by public relations department of municipality (what is sadly very popular in most of traditional media) – such “information” is only useful to corrupt officials or sciolists. With our activities are also urging residents to be more social, we are trying to seek voice of residents to be heard and taken into account. After all, according to the law it should be so – but why we do not have this in reality? Together we can try to change that!
And there were a lot of things over this year:
- Multiple pickets and even a meeting in front of municipality, which was attended by representatives from completely different political parties (in fact, only representatives of the ruling majority were not present).
- Participation in the broadcasts of TV (Channel InfoTV, show “Infodiena”) and radio stations.
- Letters from international organizations (International Public Transport Association, which unites 3,400 member organizations from 92 countries, the European Commission Mobility and Transport Directorate-General, etc.), which have confirmed that the trolleybus system is not outdated, and it should not be destroyed, but contrary, it should be modernized, upgraded and developed.
- Relationship established with equipment manufacturer Vossloh Kiepe (Dusseldorf, Germany), with the company which operates the trolleybus system (Salzburg, Austria), with scientists from Lithuania, Poland, and Russia.
- Round table discussion in the Vilnius city municipality about the situation of public transport situation in Vilnius and it’s prospects. Conference about public transport in Vilnius and Lithuania which was organized in the building of Lithuanian Parliament.
- Meetings and discussions with politicians in Vilnius city municipality, Parliament of Lithuania.
- Appeals to the General Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Lithuania, Vilnius Regional Prosecutor’s Office with the request to protect the public interest and to prevent property of citizens from destruction.
Thanks again to all people and organizations who support us, thanks to everyone who provide important information, thanks to all who share the information which we publish.
We hope that even more people will join us. And it does not matter who you are – a student or an associate professor, an employee or a manager, a lawyer or a singer, a writer or a photographer: everyone can find the best and most interesting activity in our group. Everyone can be useful if he/she only wants this!
We are also preparing a small surprise on this occasion. More about this will be announced in our website and facebook page in the coming days, and now – a small hint 😎
