The modernisation of Romania-Bulgaria rail links is at a standstill, according to European Commissioner for Transport Adina Vălean, who held a press conference in Bucharest on Thursday. She was answering questions from journalists about the construction of a new bridge over the Danube at Giurgiu-Ruse and the modernisation of the Craiova-Calafat railway.
The European Commission supports the project for a new bridge across the Danube between Romania and Bulgaria, but is waiting for the political situation in Sofia to stabilise, the Brussels official said.
“For the Giurgiu-Ruse bridge, this is a project that is also supported by the European Commission. In order to make progress, a company must be built between Romania and Bulgaria to propose the project. There are also these political instabilities in Bulgaria. The Commission is waiting for the situation in Bulgaria to stabilise, to identify interlocutors who can take decisions that they can follow and support, for a longer period, not just a month or two, I think that is the problem. What the European Commission is doing – it is putting permanent pressure on the authorities, more so on Bulgaria, because Romania is open. The bridge is a joint project, Bulgaria-Romania, we are waiting for the project company or the project promoter, but I have not seen the project, I think they have to submit it together. It is in the European transport maps, so they have to submit it”, said Adina Vălean.
The Friendship Bridge, built in 1954 with the support of the USSR
Designed by V. Andreev and opened on 20 June 1954, the 2.8 km long Giurgiu-Ruse Friendship Bridge is one of the two bridges over the Danube, together with the Calafat-Vidin Bridge, on the Romanian-Bulgarian border. Construction of the bridge took two and a half years and was supported by the USSR at the time.
The Friendship Bridge has both a two-lane road bridge and one for rail traffic (single line), as well as sidewalks for pedestrians. For years there has been talk of building a second bridge, parallel to the existing one, but nothing concrete has happened. There have also been discussions about building other bridges across the Danube between Romania and Bulgaria, at Calarasi-Silistra, Turnu Măgurele-Nikopol or Svishtov.
Poor access infrastructure to the New Europe Bridge
The only one to have materialised was the Friendship Bridge at Calafat-Vidin, built by the Bulgarian side with European funds and inaugurated on 14 June 2013 in a ceremony attended by the then European Commissioner for Regional Policy, Johannes Hahn, the project being financed by ISPA funds.
However, the 95 km stretch between Golenți (where the newly built railway connecting to the bridge ends) and Craiova is extremely difficult for trains. On a 57 km section of this line (Golenți-Segarcea), train speeds are limited to 30 km/hour due to the extremely poor state of the infrastructure. On the remaining 38 km (Segarcea-Craiova), the maximum speed is 70 km/h.
Adina Vălean not too optimistic
European Commissioner Adina Vălean now says that the Romanian authorities have submitted the project for upgrading the Craiova-Golenți section to Brussels and that it is in the process of being evaluated.
The official refused to give any details, saying she did not want to comment before the evaluation process was completed. However, she was not very optimistic about the project’s chances of getting the green light from the European Commission: “There is no mirror project in Bulgaria and this could be a problem.” In conclusion, the modernisation of the Romania-Bulgaria rail links remains in suspense for the time being.
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