Bus stop... and stare

Take a tour of the world's most striking bus stops in former Soviet Union countries, with MILO BOYD

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Find yourself at a bus stop in the UK, and there's a decent chance you'll share it with some wads of chewing gum and a bit of scrawled graffiti, sat on an uncomfortable bench designed to stop unhoused people from lying down. In terms of artistic flair, the most creativity you're likely to see is a traffic cone balanced on the roof.

The same cannot be said for former Soviet Union countries, where the world’s most striking and strange bus stops are scattered across the rural landscape. From Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, to Ukraine, Moldova, Armenia, Abkhazia, Georgia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Belarus, the Eastern Bloc nations are adorned with reminders of the empire in the form of public transport infrastructure, more than 30 years after it collapsed.

Our writer Jonathan Reynolds found himself enchanted by the unusual shelters during a recent trip to Moldova, a country of 2.2 million that is the poorest in Europe. What it is rich in, Jonathan discovered, is bus stops.

“For Christmas a couple of years ago, my brother had bought me the book, Soviet Bus Stops, Volume 1, and in it was a section of Moldova and pictures of these amazing bus stops that had been designed and built with such creativity and care. Often, it includes intricate mosaic designs in a structure created to provide shelter and comfort for the local commuters,” he explained.