Old buses in Latin America
I may have asked this before, but just how old are the oldest chicken buses still running in Latin America today likely?
5 Answers
Bandit said: Bandita asked:
Marianne have you ridden with the locals carrying their livestock on board?
O M G...yes, they certainly do exist here in Guatemala and are quite dangerous because of the drivers' carelessness and excessive speed. We have some narrow and treacherous mountain roads here that require caution...but that seems to be irrelevant to the drivers. In fact, there is at least one fatal accident a week reported in the newspapers.
The main reason people still ride them is because it's super cheap (3 Quetzales = 30 cents).
As Bandita says, the official name is "Camioneta," but they are called "Chicken Buses" because people bring everything aboard, including chickens, dogs, goats, etc., on market day.
How old are they? No idea, but they were built well before we had exhaust omission regulations...The spew black smog along the highways. Yuck!
I'm not sure but I think they're great, here's one I travelled on this week.
Wikipedia.com no tiene cualquier información sobre de los comienzos del "chicken bus", pero es se llama una "camionetta" y se encuentra en Guatemala, El Salvador , Honduras, Nicaragua & Panamá. ¡Hmmm, Marianne has viajado con los locales que llevan su ganado a bordo! 
¿Cómo conseguir todas esas cosas ahí arriba?
Por favor, corrija mi español.
Wikipedia.com doesn't have any information about the beginnings of the "chicken bus", but it is called a "camionetta" and is found in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua & Panama. Hmmm, Marianne have you ridden with the locals carrying their livestock on board?
How do they get all that stuff up there?
In Boloivia it is the roads that are far more scary than the busses.
Have a look at this thread for more info.
