Kazakhstan's national railway company is considering changing the way seats are sold in train compartments to avoid placing unfamiliar men and women together. The company, Kazakhstan Temir Zholy (KTZ), said specialists are already studying such a system, according to infohub.kz.
The discussion was prompted by a post from a Kazakh woman on the social network Threads. She highlighted the rules for selling railway tickets in Turkey, where if a man buys the first seat in a compartment, the remaining seats are offered to men only. Similarly, if a woman buys the first ticket, only women are offered the remaining seats.
"Why can't you do this in Kazakhstan already, please," she addressed KTZ.
The company responded that such a mechanism has already caught the attention of specialists. "This system is already being studied by our specialists. The question of implementing the system will be considered later," KTZ stated.
It is not yet reported when a decision might be made and on which trains such an option could potentially appear.
Meanwhile, fully segregated travel options already exist in Kazakhstan. On key routes, female passengers can use the "women's carriage" service. Earlier it was reported that on September 2, another women's carriage was launched in Kazakhstan.