Locomotives for Hungarians, Railways for Slovenians, and Improved Highway Barriers for Croatians

On the European Commission website, it has been announced that the EU will support the goals of the European Green Deal and the Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy by allocating more than 7 billion euros for 134 projects that will contribute to the creation of a ‘sustainable, smart, environmentally friendly, and resilient transport infrastructure network’.

All projects were selected under the call for proposals of the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) for 2023, and CEF is an EU funding program that supports European transport infrastructure.

The new projects will build or upgrade transport infrastructure to improve railways, inland waterways, roads, and short sea routes. Some projects will also connect to inland or maritime ports, airports, and multimodal terminals, and projects in Ukraine and Moldova will be supported for the development of EU solidarity lanes and smart traffic management systems for inland waterways, air, and road transport.

– This is the largest call under the current CEF Transport program. The selected projects will help transform the European transport network, making cleaner modes of transport more efficient and attractive for passengers and freight, while also increasing safety across the TEN-T network. I am particularly pleased that several projects supporting the EU-Ukraine Solidarity Lanes have been funded. These new corridors are crucial for assisting the integration of Ukraine and Moldova into the EU,” said EU Climate Action Commissioner Wopke Hoekstra.

Railways and Ports

Major cross-border railway connections along the main TEN-T network will be supported, such as Rail Baltica, the Lyon-Turin line (connecting France and Italy), and the Fehmarnbelt tunnel (connecting Denmark and Germany). Furthermore, cross-border points between Ukraine and Moldova and EU countries (Romania, Hungary, and Poland) will be improved to facilitate easier traffic flow for Ukrainian imports and exports. At the same time, the European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS) will be significantly deployed on trains and railway lines across the EU to enhance interoperability and safety in rail traffic.

About 20 seaports in Ireland, Spain, Finland, the Netherlands, Germany, Malta, Lithuania, Cyprus, Croatia, Greece, and Poland will be upgraded; the development will enable vessels to receive electrical power from the shore and transport renewable energy offshore.

Infrastructure interventions on inland waterways will develop cross-border connections between France and Belgium in the Seine-Scheldt basin and between Romania and Bulgaria on the Danube. Inland water ports in Austria, Germany, and the Netherlands will also receive support to continue promoting modal shift towards the European network of rivers and canals.

Everyone knows, Croatia does not

Among the 134 projects, there are a couple from Croatia, which are at least not impressive, and it raises the question of why larger projects were not pursued, for instance, regarding the railway, which has been in disarray for years. Croatia has applied for only three projects with a total value of around 42 million euros, namely the project ‘improvement of the highway barrier on the A3 highway‘, then the project ‘repair of the breakwater at the Port of Pula‘, and ‘study for the electrical supply of ships in the Port of Rijeka‘.

The first project on the A3 involves upgrading the safety road infrastructure on the Bregana-Zagreb-Lipovac highway, specifically the Lipovljani-Nova Gradiška section in Croatia. As part of the project, about 47 km of protective road barriers will be installed. The main benefits of the project will be increased road safety on a section with poor performance in the TEN-T network in Croatia.

The second project involves the reconstruction and upgrading of the basic port infrastructure in the Port of Pula. The main outcome of the project will be increased operational efficiency in the TEN-T port, while the third project includes studies and works for the installation of a land-based electrical power system in the Port of Rijeka. The main advantages of the project will be a more sustainable port that will provide electrical power to vessels and reduce air pollution.

What other countries are doing

And while we are dealing with repairs of breakwaters and air pollution, other Union countries are thinking bigger or better, and thus they have projects for which they receive grants. Although it is a lot to list the other hundred projects, we can highlight a few just to give you an idea of the range of projects that countries have applied for and for which they have received grant euros.

For instance, Austria is working on upgrading its railways, having rejected funds for the improvement of the railway line between Schaftenau and Radfeld, which is part of the northern access route to the Brenner tunnel base, and for the upgrade of the freight terminal in Graz, where the works include new railway infrastructure for freight trains up to 740 meters long and the upgrade of the existing single-track line between Leibnitz and the Slovenian border to a double-track line.

Bulgaria, for example, received funding for the project ‘From East 2 West Connections’, which aims to build new railway lines within the Burgas seaport in Bulgaria. The main benefit of the project is a more sustainable port and increased competitiveness of rail freight transport.

Germany is upgrading its railways, which proved deficient during the recently concluded European Football Championship, but is also building freight terminals on the Danube. They are also upgrading their freight locomotives, as many as nineteen.

The Greeks are also modernizing their railway, while the Spaniards have the highest number of reported projects, including the construction of an international railway terminal and the expansion of ports in Seville and Almeria.

Our neighbors, the Slovenians, are investing in the Ljubljana-Divača railway and a multimodal bus/rail terminal in Ljubljana at the expense of the EU, while the Hungarians are building a new railway ring around Budapest and even 35 new locomotives.

As we can see from these few examples, we have fallen short, and the question is why some larger and more useful projects could not be applied for to capture this free EU funding.

You can review all projects in detail at this link.