STA, 1 June 2019 - June brings change to public transport as a universal integrated transport service kicks in on Saturday. A passenger, buying one pass, will be able to use all means of public transport available, notably bus, coach and railway services of all transport service providers.

For those commuting daily to Ljubljana from nearby towns, 35 to 40 new fast bus or coach services will be introduced, which means they will have only one stop in-between.

Monthly and annual passes will be available as of today, with the former costing the equivalent of 32 single passes and the latter the equivalent of eight monthly passes.

This is in line with the government's decision in April, when a decree on the new integrated system of public transport for passengers was adopted.

New single, daily and weekly passes will be introduced in August, to be followed up in 2020 with an integrated monthly pass at the price of only 26 single passes.

Prices depend on the length of the journey; the lowest one was set for a distance of up to 5 kilometres (EUR 1.3) and the highest for over 150 kilometres (EUR 13).

Transport providers taking part in the new scheme will have an option of offering up to a 30% discount for monthly and annual passes.

The government decreed a 20% discount as the lowest possible for annual passes, as its goal is to have more than 80% of all passengers opt for annual or monthly passes.

The set prices are generally the prices of coach services, although transport officials have expected lower prices to encourage the use of public transport.

Although rail and bus fares should cost the same under the decree, business daily Finance recently reported rail operator Slovenske Železnice (SŽ) did not plan a price rise.

Commenting on the new system for Finance, Robert Sever of the GZS's transport section said last month: "We don't expect a revolution, but the fast lines will attract somewhat more passengers. However, passengers from Postojna will still get stuck in traffic jams on the motorway just like those in cars."

The expansion of the integrated passenger transport service comes after secondary school and university students started testing it in the 2016/17 academic year.

Finance has reported some EUR 120 million is available for public transport services a year, of which SŽ and 25 coach companies as the providers of the public service of integrated passenger transport received almost EUR 44 million for subsidised student passes in 2018.