[ad_1]
In order not to return hundreds of millions of euros to Brussels, the Romanian authorities hope to be able to extend until August 2026 the completion of the Lugoj-Deva motorway, which is missing a section of about ten kilometers. This is the stretch between Margina and Holdea, where two bear tunnels are to be built, estimated at around 300 million euros. At the time of approving the financing of the Lugoj-Deva motorway, the European Commission asked Romania to have the entire motorway in circulation by the end of 2023. The tunnel section still has no builder.
Work on the Lugoj-Deva road began in 2011. Four years later, the Italians from Tirrena Scavi completed Lot 1.
In March 2017 we had a new opening.
Salini, also an Italian builder, had completed 15 kilometers of the 28 of the second batch of the road.
In the summer of the same year, however, Drumuri bosses broke the contract with the Salini company and left some 13 kilometers of the highway without a builder, of which 4 were built at a rate of 90%.
The last two lots on the highway were also put into circulation last year. Most of the money for the construction of the Lugoj-Deva highway came from Brussels.
How the so-called “bear tunnels” got it wrong
The only missing part remains the withdrawal of the Salini group, where the environmental agreement revised in December 2013 requires the construction of two ecoducts for the protection of large mammals, the so-called “bear tunnels”. Really, These are the only remaining kilometers of road between Sibiu and Nădlac.
representatives The Pro Infrastructure Association warned in the spring of this year: “Romania risks losing all the European money used on the entire Lugoj-Deva motorway because traffic must be opened before the end of 2023 for European Commission officials to consider the Lugoj-Deva project functional”.
Just in July last year, the Highway Company launched a tender for the construction of the tunnel section, which stalled after the CNAIR was forced by the International Court of Arbitration to recognize that the old contract for the construction of lot 2 , that of Salini’s Italians, is still in force. CNAIR was also forced to pay a compensation of 50 million euros to the Italians.
Minister of Transportation: “We will ask the contractor to complete the works on the four kilometers, they are 70% finished, and we will auction section E with km 9-9.8”.
In order not to return to Brussels the hundreds of millions of euros used to finance the construction of the sections that are already in circulation, The government wants to pass the part of the tunnels on the financing of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan.
Minister of European Funds: “The gain we have with the transfer of the project is that the deadline that we must meet if we complete negotiations with the European Commission becomes August 31, 2026.”
This means that Good years from now between Margina and Holdea, drivers will also drive with DN68A.
More than nine billion euros will be invested in infrastructure projects through the National Recovery and Resilience Plan.
Publisher: Georgiana Marina
