Trolley service is returning to the Estonian capital next summer — this time with 40 battery-powered Škoda trolleybuses connecting Mustamäe with either Baltic Station (Balti jaam) or Kaubamaja. In the city center, the new fleet will run without overhead wires.  

The city government had also considered buying 30 more battery-powered trolleys, which Deputy Mayor Kristjan Järvan (Isamaa) said could have revived the old number 9 line connecting Mustamäe with Kopli. Seventeen would have been EU-funded, with the remainder paid for by the city.

Tallinn City Council, however, has blocked the move.

Järvan said the Reform Party, Center Party and Conservative People's Party of Estonia (EKRE) did not support the plan. He criticized the formerly coalition Reform Party, noting that while they had initially promised to back reasonable proposals, they later signaled they might not support this one.

"Basically, the story was that if they can't get that €10 million to eliminate kindergarten fees, they won't support anything else either," he added.

Even so, the deputy mayor hopes the extra trolleybuses can still be purchased later, either from a post-election supplementary budget or next year's main city budget.

"This ultimately likely means the trolleys will arrive later than planned," Järvan said, adding that prices may change as well.

Reform Party member Kristo Enn Vaga said his party isn't opposed to buying the battery-powered trolleybuses; they objected to the timing.

The €10 million amendment was added to the supplementary budget just weeks before the vote, without prior consultation or procurement review.

"You can't just throw tens of millions of euros around like that — it's not good governance practice," Vaga criticized. " We certainly support innovative transit options, but these [projects] need to be analyzed more carefully, the procurements reviewed and the entire process planned more thoroughly."

City ordering 30 new natural gas buses

Meanwhile, the City of Tallinn-owned transport company AS Tallinna Linnatransport (TLT) is buying 30 new natural gas buses to gradually replace older diesel models.

Turkish manufacturer BMC won the nearly €11 million contract for 20 standard and ten articulated buses, with deliveries expected about eight months after signing.

The contract also gives TLT the option to purchase up to 60 additional buses.

Järvan called the new buses an important step in modernizing Tallinn's public transportation system, noting that a challenging European bus market had caused three previous procurement attempts to fail.

"EU climate policy requires fleet replacement across Europe, which has driven up prices and left factories unable to produce enough," the deputy mayor explained.

"Several manufacturers asked for extra time on the procurements, and we even extended some by three months when their resources were tied up," he continued. "But in the end, there still weren't any bids. On the fourth try, we allowed Turkish bidders as well."

This is BMC's first delivery of buses to Estonia, a move the company sees as key to strengthening its presence in the Baltic region.

"This gives us a strong opportunity to contribute to cleaner, more efficient public transport in Estonia," BMC international sales director Tarik Ozeler said in a press release.

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