Global InformationTro tro information
In Ghana and neighboring countries, tro tro are privately owned minibus share taxis that travel fixed routes leaving when filled to capacity.[1] While there are tro tro stations, these vehicles for hire can also be boarded anywhere along the route.[2]
Operated by a driver and a conductor (who collects money, shouts out the destination, and can also be called a "mate"), many are decorated with slogans and religious sayings.[3] Fewer tro tros operate on Sundays.[4]
The term is believed to derive from the Ga word tro, "threepence", because the conductors usually asked for "three three pence", which was the standard bus fare in the 1940s, when Ghana still uses the British West African pound and later the Ghanaian pound.[5][6]
Alternatively, its origin is not "three times three pence" but rather "threepence [thruhpnce, tro] each": doubling a coin's name in the vernacular means "that coin for each person (or item)". Three pence was the price per passenger in the early 1960s, when pounds/shillings/pence were still in use, including threepence coins, before decimalization of the currency into cedi and pesewa in 1965. [7]
- ^
- For private ownership and fixed routes, see Report from the Field: The Tro-Tro – An Essential Mode of Transport in Accra, Ghana by Susan Blaustein. blogs.ei.columbia.edu, 9.29.2010
- For leaving when full, see Ghana: The Bradt Travel Guide (page 69) Philip Briggs. Bradt Travel Guides, 2007. 4th ed. 416 pages. 1841622052, 9781841622057 (Google Books)
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
cblogwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^
- For tro tro mates, see Report from the Field: The Tro-Tro – An Essential Mode of Transport in Accra, Ghana by Susan Blaustein. blogs.ei.columbia.edu, 9.29.2010
- For slogans and sayings, see TroTro Station ghanaweb.com
- For religious slogans and sayings, see TroTro: Transport for the People by the People ghanaweb.com
- ^ Ghana: The Bradt Travel Guide (page 69) Philip Briggs. Bradt Travel Guides, 2007. 4th ed. 416 pages. 1841622052, 9781841622057 (Google Books)
- ^ "tro-tro - Definition of tro-tro in English by Oxford Dictionaries". Oxford Dictionaries - English. Archived from the original on August 26, 2018.
- ^ "TroTro: Transport for the People by the People". www.ghanaweb.com.
- ^ "Trotro_(Ghana)". www.in-formality.com.