Index – Economy – László Palkovics: The Budapest-Belgrade railway reference project
“The Hungarian section of the modernization and capacity expansion investment of the Budapest-Belgrade railway line, worth more than two billion dollars, is a reference project, as this is the first Chinese-Hungarian development that is carried out jointly with Chinese partners in Hungary in accordance with the rules of the European Union,” said Minister of Technology and Industry Kiskőrös , where he was informed about the works on site.
László Palkovics emphasized: in the current phase of the investment, which will be completed by 2025, they are working on the construction of the track with high-performance, special machines. With the complete renovation of the Budapest-Belgrade railway line, the goods going from China to Europe will be able to reach their destination via Hungary the fastest, touching the Greek ports.
The project is of special importance from a strategic, domestic and international point of view
The head of the ministry pointed out that the railway line has become part of the Silk Road connecting China, Asia and Europe, and the section leading to China via Ukraine and touching Russia and Kazakhstan is mostly unusable, but traffic is provided on the section coming to Europe via Turkey.
In the summer, it was signed with the Serbian, Bulgarian and Turkish co-ministers that the Central Silk Road passing under the Bosphorus will also be connected to the railway line.
It is of primary interest that no matter which direction the Silk Road goes, its railway section passes through Hungary. The minister considers it important that the railway traffic that might be diverted during the construction will be diverted. The section between Szeged–Röszke–Szabadka has already been completed, so there is a detour while the section next to the next complete track closure is being built.
Palkovics announced that a significant part of the track usage fee is waived to the transport companies during this period. By the end of the year, 2.2 billion forints less will be paid for the use of the track, and next year 10 billion forints less, so rail traffic will not be transferred to the public road during this transitional period, nor will it bypass Hungary.
The northern part of Budapest will also support the traffic in the suburbs of Budapest, as a continuous schedule will be able to significantly increase the current number of one million passengers.
“It will be a particularly high-quality, fast, comfortable and safe mode of transport,” said the minister. Zoltán Pafféri, the president and CEO of the MÁV-Volán group, said: the first section of railway line 150, which is 140 years old this year, between Budapest and Szabadka, was opened to traffic in 1882.
The journey time between Budapest and Belgrade will be reduced by less than half
The works that started last October have now entered a new, faster phase. At the Kiskőrös railway station, track stabilization and large-scale machine work has begun. The approximately 160-kilometer track is built on an axle load of 22.5 tons, which enables fast passenger traffic and the transport of large quantities of goods.
The goal of the European Union is to transfer 50 percent of medium-distance passenger and goods transport to rail and waterways by 2050, thereby reducing emissions from transport by 60 percent.
– remarked Zoltán Pafféri, adding: the journey time for passenger transport in the suburbs will be twenty minutes shorter, on the Budapest-Kelebia route, the current journey time of almost eight hours between Budapest and Belgrade will be reduced to three and a half hours.
István Sárvári, the general manager of the contractor V-Híd Zrt., talks about mechanization during investments of about twenty billion forints in recent years. It has all the machines necessary to build the railway lines on time and with the right quality. Sándor Font and Gábor Bányai, members of parliament from the governing party in Bács-Kiskun county, welcomed the investment of great importance for the region, MTI reported.
(Cover photo: Minister of Innovation and Technology László Palkovics [b] and Zoltán Pafféri, the president and CEO of the MÁV-Volán group, will arrive at the press conference on the modernization of the Budapest-Belgrade railway line at the loading area near the Kiskőrös railway station on August 26, 2022. Photo: Zsolt Szigetváry / MTI)