How fast Bucharest's buses, trams and trolleybuses really move

#How slow, at what time

The speed below is the distance travelled by the vehicles observed divided by the time it took, stops and traffic lights included, but not waiting at the terminus. Between 05:00 and 06:00 the average was 18.7 km/h. The slowest hour was 17:00–18:00, at 12.3 km/h.

Trams and trolleybuses are slower than buses: between 17:00 and 18:00, trams 11.3 km/h, trolleybuses 10.5 km/h, buses 13.0 km/h. The typical distance between stops, from the timetable, is 524 metres for trams, 471 for buses and 420 for trolleybuses; the data does not show why trams are slower. The day measured falls in the autumn school holiday (24 October–1 November), so it is not an ordinary school day.

#The timetable and reality

For 11,094 trips, the vehicle could be followed over the whole stretch between its first and last stop, without the first and last 500 metres. The timetable gives a time for exactly the same stretch. The typical trip ran at 99.4% of timetable speed: 16.6% of trips were more than 10% slower, 20.4% more than 10% faster. The timetable already allows for congestion: in the evening, 17:00–19:00, only 4 of the 78 lines measured ran more than 10% slower than planned. The largest gap: bus 385, at 11.6 km/h against 16.1 km/h.

The timetabled speed of every STB line, hour by hour →

#The trips that never appeared

Of the 18,537 timetabled STB trips that were eligible (leaving from 05:00 and timetabled to arrive at least two hours before the last data), 9.1% never appeared in the collected data. A trip can be missing because it did not run, because its vehicle did not report its position, or because the collection had a gap; the data cannot tell these apart. The 14 lines mentioned in the feed's service-change alerts are not counted (10.9% of their trips are missing).

The share is higher for evening departures: 13.4% of trips leaving 17:00–18:00 and 14.2% of those from 18:00, against 5.5% of those from 05:00. On some lines far more are missing: bus 655 (45.3%), bus 216 (44.7%), bus 246 (30.3%).

#How crowded

Vehicles also report in the feed how full they are, on a scale from "empty" to "full". The chart shows, for each line, what share of its evening reports (17:00–19:00) that carry this field say "standing room only" or "full". Reports without an occupancy value are not counted.

#How it was measured

Bucharest's transport company STB and the other operators publish, through the TPBI transport authority, a real-time data feed in GTFS Realtime format: each vehicle's position, the trip it is on and how full it is; a vehicle's position typically updates every 26 seconds. The feed was read every 20 seconds on Monday 26 October 2026, from 02:13 to 23:29: 2,336,145 positions, with 4 gaps longer than a minute; the longest, 14 minutes, began at 18:03. The 23:00 hour is incomplete and left out of the charts.

Each position was placed on its trip's route from the timetable TPBI publishes (version of 7 October 2026). Two successive positions of the same vehicle, 15–180 seconds apart, give the distance travelled and the time. Positions more than 40 metres from the route (detours, depots) were set aside.

The speed of a street or an hour is the sum of distances divided by the sum of times: the average travel speed, stops and traffic lights included. Waiting at the terminus is left out: the first 500 metres after a trip's first stop and the last 500 before its last are not counted. A "stretch of street" is a 100-metre piece of route grouped with its neighbours by position and direction, so it is approximate. The map shows only stretches crossed by at least 6 different trips in the chosen hour.

A trip "appeared" if at least one vehicle position reported it. Only STB trips due to finish at least two hours before the last data are counted, leaving out lines the feed's alerts listed as diverted, suspended or blocked. The metro is not in the feed.

This is one working day, with its own weather, roadworks and events. The numbers describe 26 October, not a yearly average.

#Sources

• Bucharest–Ilfov public transport authority (ADTPBI), GTFS Realtime feed produced by FlashWeb IT: vehicle positions, alerts (read every 20 seconds on 26 October 2026)
• TPBI, Bucharest–Ilfov public transport timetable in GTFS (version of 7 October 2026)
• Mobility Database, TPBI feed record
• OpenStreetMap: street names and base map (© OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL)

A page by Marius Comper, published on 26 October 2026.