LGV Bordeaux-Toulouse. The Department of Haute-Garonne will spend 631 million euros for the project
Through Guillaume Laurens
Published on
631.03 million euros. This is the colossal envelope that the elected officials of the Haute-Garonne Departmental Council validated, Tuesday October 26, 2021 at Toulouse, for the community’s contribution to the financing of the Great South West Railway Project (GPSO), which notably plans to rally Bordeaux a Toulouse in LGV, and so to put the 4e city in France at 3h10 from Paris, against 4h20 currently.
The Department will pay more than the Toulouse Metropolis
“This contribution, which constitutes a maximum amount “, insists the Departmental Council, will concern the Toulouse-Bordeaux part for 616.73 M € and the Bordeaux-Dax axis for 14.3 M €. Or a total envelope of € 631 million, approved subject to the creation of a local public establishment (EPL), “Which will establish a link between all the local partners, before March 2022 and, above all, will have to get them all to commit to the financial aspect of the operation”. Without this company, the painful would climb to 747 million euros for the Department, an amount on which the community did not venture on Tuesday, she said to Toulouse news.
The Department will pay more than the Toulouse Metropolis
In passing, the Department takes care to point out that it is ” the 2e funder of Occitanie ”of the LGV, behind the Occitanie Region (which will put 1.2 billion euros), but ahead of the Toulouse Metropolis (which pledged Thursday, October 14 to pay 506 to 613 million euros, with or without creating an EPL).
As a reminder, it will take 7.5 billion euros to achieve Bordeaux-Toulouse, and 10.3 billion euros for the entire GPSO project, including the Bordeaux-Dax link. On this last sum, the State promised in April 2021 to pay 4.1 billion euros. Knowing that a contribution from the European Union is expected up to 20% of the total cost of the project, with local authorities in Occitanie and Nouvelle-Aquitaine responsible for finding the remaining sum …
In recent weeks, Prime Minister Jean Castex had instructed the Prefect of Occitanie Étienne Guyot to coordinate the entire project. At the end of a meeting with the president of the Region Carole Delga, and the presidents of the other communities, the duo had split a press release specifying that “six departments of Haute-Garonne, Gers, Lot, Hautes-Pyrénées, Tarn and Tarn-et-Garonne as well as the urban communities of Albi, Auch, Cahors, Castres-Mazamet, Montauban, Muret, SICOVAL, Tarbes-Lourdes and the Toulouse Metropolis are thus committed to the financing of the project ”.
But if the Occitan local communities are well and truly unanimous for the financing of the GPSO, it is not exactly the same on the side of the New Aquitaine region, where the president of Lot-et-Garonne refuses to pay the contribution of 120 million euros which is due to her. demand.
Georges Méric: “The Department has supported the project since its inception”
For its part, “the Departmental Council of Haute-Garonne has supported the speed of the Toulouse-Bordeaux long-distance line project since its inception and has never ceased to mobilize to achieve this structuring equipment for our territory”, judged this Tuesday the president Georges meric, at the end of this important decision of his community.
“Today, I am delighted with the significant progress of this national-scale project, which will place the 4th largest city in France at the rank of European capital, with finally possible interconnection between Northern and Eastern Europe. and Southern Europe, but also with the entire Mediterranean arc. This national and European openness will be a tremendous asset in opening up and strengthening the attractiveness of our territory, for the benefit of economic players and all its inhabitants “.
Georges Méric confronted with a fait accompli
” The sound and rigorous financial management, supported by the Departmental Council for many years, allows us today to support the major development projects of our territory ”, pledges President Méric, while regretting having been put in front of a fait accompli by Étienne Guyot and Carole Delga:
“I regret, however, that the financing plan was not the subject of prior consultation with all the finances. I ask the State to take its responsibilities in order to succeed in the round table with the actors concerned. and allow the start of work in 2023, as announced by the Prefect of Haute-Garonne last September “.
Georges Méric “attentive to the future operation” of the LGV
Georges Méric recalls that “the Departmental Council asked the State to create a local public establishment (EPL) within the framework of the LOM law to” ensure the financing of the project “, but also” to design and operate these infrastructures ” .
And if the president is delighted that his assembly “is committed today to an investment for the future which should be able to benefit all Haut-Garonnaises and all Haut-Garonnais”, he warns: “We will be attentive to future operation of the Toulouse-Bordeaux high-speed line ”.
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