Getting around town: microbuses and buses

The backbone of city transport in Syria is a white microbus. People call it a servees, or a meecro for short. Each one takes ten to twelve passengers, runs a fixed route, and charges about a tenth of what a taxi does. In return, nothing about it is written down: no timetable, no ticket, no sign at the stop. This page makes that unwritten system readable.

What a servees is

A servees is not a municipal bus but a vehicle run as a small business. The route is fixed, the times are not: it leaves when it fills and picks up anyone along the way who raises a hand. The idea of a stop is weak, because the vehicle halts wherever it can pull in. They are frequent morning and evening, thin in the middle of the day, and close to absent late at night.

Finding your route

The route is written in Arabic on the windscreen and nowhere else. There is no app, no map and no line number to look up. What works is asking: put the question to the owner of the place you are staying or to a shopkeeper — which servees goes there — then read the windscreens of the vehicles passing where you stand. If you cannot read Arabic, show the name of the quarter written in Arabic on your phone; our page of Syrian Arabic phrases gives you those few words. Cities have big interchange points, and in Damascus the best known is Baramkeh.

Boarding and getting off

To board you raise a hand; the vehicle slows and you do the running, because it does not fully stop. Sitting near the door inside makes leaving easier. To get off you have to say so out loud: “aa janb” means pull over to the side, and that phrase works everywhere. The driver sets you down at the roadside, not at a door. If you need to cross, walk behind the vehicle rather than in front of it.

How the fare is paid

There are no tickets. Money is passed forward from hand to hand to the driver while the vehicle moves, and change comes back the same way. The fare follows the length of the route and the driver sets it: a short ride is 20 to 50 new pounds, and longer routes reach 80. Those figures are tiny beside a taxi fare, which is exactly why you must carry small notes — nobody has change for a big one. Our page on money and cash in Syria describes the notes now in use.

Buses and coach stations

Larger cities also run municipal buses, though less often than the microbuses, and again with no written stop information. Intercity services are a different arrangement altogether: they leave from a coach station, tickets are sold in advance and seats are numbered. Do not mix the two; our page on getting around Syria covers that side separately. Airport routes are separate again, and sit on the Damascus airport transfer page.

Changing vehicles, and walking

One route will not take you everywhere; joining two microbuses is normal, and the second fare is as small as the first. The easiest place to change is a large square, because that is where the routes converge. One thing should be said at the outset, though: in the old cities walking is usually faster. The historic core of Damascus and of Aleppo is a couple of kilometres across, and inside that span traffic will not let a vehicle beat you. The servees earns its place once you leave the core — for the museum, the coach station, a distant quarter.

For women passengers

The vehicle is narrow and crowded, and the settled habit is for women to sit beside women, with the seat next to the driver left free rather than offered to a woman travelling alone. Making room when a woman wants to sit next to you is ordinary courtesy. If contact in a crowded vehicle becomes uncomfortable, saying so out loud works; other passengers usually step in. Our page for women travelling in Syria covers this in detail. When services thin out at night, a taxi or an app is the better choice.

When it works and when it does not

The servees is the best vehicle for anyone who wants to move through daily life rather than past it, and it brings a budget down visibly. It fails in three situations: with luggage, in high heat, and when an appointment depends on the clock. The same goes for travelling between cities, for catching something early in the morning, and for reaching a place that looks close on a map but has no route running to it. On those days a taxi or one of the local apps serves better, and our page on taxis in Syria sets out which app works where.