A small section ticket with great imagery

Obverse

The obverse features the coat of arms of Budapest with the year, 1933, above and ·B·SZ·K·RT· below. These are the intitials of what translates as “The Budapest Metropolitan Transport Company Limited by Shares”.

In 1873, the three main cities of Buda, Pest and Óbuda, were united into one. The new combined coat of arms contains a three-towered castle representing the Royal Castle of Buda, below a single tower castle representing Pest. These are separated by a white stripe representing the river Danube and crowned by the Holy Crown of Hungary. The shield is surrounded by a lion and a griffon.

BSZKRT was formed in 1922, controlling all public transport in the city. At its height, it employed over 10,000 people.

This original piece features the engraver’s name, BERÁN L. (Lajos Berán) to the right of the griffin. Numista notes that copper, silver and gilded copper restrikes of these were made in 1960 by Artex, and these don’t have Berán’s name.

Reverse

I really love the reverse on thie piece, the winged wheel with lightning / electricity coming off it, gives the impression of speed.

BSZKRT was formed in 1922, unifying the city’s public transport under one company,. The city’s leaders also sat on the board of this company, allowing more holistic solutions to be implemented.

Rolling stock and insfrastructure were improved in the interwar years, although the subsequent seige of Budapest in WWII, 84% of the overhead line network and much rolling stock was destroyed.

These trams, as seen on the BKV.hu site, show a picture of the tram network before WWII.

The text on the bottom of the token reads ·KIS·SZAKASZ·JEGY·, which translates as “Small Section Ticket”.

Transport in Budapest today is run by Budapesti Közlekedési Központ (BKK). Paper tickets are still valid but are being phased out in favour of electronic tickets purchased on their mobile app.