Highway construction advances at snail’s pace

Romania is preparing for what will be the most expensive highway it has built so far, the 289 km highway connecting Targu Mures and Iasi, with costs predicted to range between EUR 11 – 60 million per km. BR looks at what highways have been opened so far this year and what should be delivered by the end of 2012.

By Simona Bazavan

Over the past 20 years Romania has built only about 400 km of highway, although the authorities have been constantly talking up ambitious plans for highways to cross the country.  The high costs for the 289 km highway connecting Targu Mures and Iasi are mainly due to the difficult terrain, the Romanian National Company of Motorways and National Roads (CNADNR) announced at the beginning of September.

But while such ambitious plans remain in the first phase of development, other highway projects where works began even several years ago remain unfinished.

After numerous delays the 62 km highway that connects Bucharest and Ploiesti was finally opened to traffic this July, two years behind schedule. The EUR 450 million project was built by Italian consortium Impressa Pizzarotti/Tirrena Scavi and an association made up of local companies Spedition UMB, Pa&Co International, Euroconstruct ’98 and Com-Axa.

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The two-year delay in completing the project is nothing out of the ordinary when it comes to building highways in Romania, an endeavor that continues to stumble, much to the despair of investors. And while building highways has been cited as a priority by every Romanian politician over the past decade, the reality is very different from the ambitious plans boasted by each and every government.

For example, the above mentioned Bucharest-Ploiesti segment (62 km) is part of the future A3 highway (565 km), or the Transylvania Highway, which should connect Bucharest with Bors, in western Romania, close to the Hungarian border. Only about 20 percent of this highway is presently finished although the contracts to build it were signed as early as 2003.

This summer has also seen the partial completion the 20.5 km Cernavoda-Medgidia segment of the Bucharest-Constanta highway as well as the northern part of the  Constanta bypass. The entire 197 km highway which connects the capital Bucharest with the Black Sea city of Constanta should have been completed last year, but the authorities said they had to cancel the initial contract signed with French Colas which made the successful bid for the Cernavoda-Medgidia segment as the company “constantly refused to continue works, citing various reasons to justify the delays”. After the contract was canceled, Italian Astaldi and German Max Boegl, the two companies also responsible for building the Medgidia-Constanta segment – won the new tender.

Some of the most important sites currently undergoing work are on the 594 km A1 highway connecting Bucharest with Nadlac on the Hungarian border, part of the Pan-European Corridor IV. The highway is divided into numerous segments with about a third of its total length being completed and another third in the works. The 113 km part of the highway connecting Bucharest with Pitesti was built in 1973, and in 2007 a 15 km Ploiesti bypass was delivered. The only segments delivered since then are the 32.3 km highway connecting Timisoara to Arad, which cost EUR 194 million and is some 98 percent completed, and a Sibiu bypass. Another 32 km section between Deva and Orastie, which is being built by Austrian Strabag and Romanian constructor Straco Grup, should be opened to traffic this October, and works will be completed in February 2013, according to the CNADNR. Part of the same highway, a 9.5 km segment between Timisoara and Lugoj could be delivered this autumn, ahead of the official April 2013 deadline, making it a first in Romania.

 The road ahead

The government announced last week that the CNADNR will have to limit new infrastructure projects to the budgets approved, meaning some plans will have to be put on hold. The announcement comes after the recent budgetary amendment cut some EUR 290 million from the funds allocated to the Ministry of Transport to a total of EUR 3.05 billion. The largest share of it – about EUR 230 million – was taken from the funds necessary to co-finance projects drawing on non-refundable EU money, according to Mediafax newswire.

Another EUR 24 million was taken from the road infrastructure development budget, which was reduced to EUR 14.3 million. As a result, the CNADNR no longer has the necessary funds to continue works on the rehabilitation of the Bucharest bypass, and other projects too will have to be put on hold.

Despite the cuts, authorities will this autumn announce the companies that have been selected to build the next 107 km of highway. An impressive 95 consortiums made up of local and foreign companies took part in the public bid, proving that public infrastructure projects are big business for the constructions industry in the present economic climate. The increased interest in the projects could also mean the CNADNR will pay less for a km of highway. Some of the bids made by participants go as low as EUR 3.5 million per kilometer of highway, considerably less than the record levels such as EUR 16 million per kilometer paid so for. The 107 km are part of the A3 highway and are divided into five projects varying in length between 28.7 km and 8.7 km.