The Government presented the General Transport Master Plan for 2014-2030

Ioan Rus, the Minister of Transport, presented the new General Transport Master Plan (GTMP) draft, which reflects the transport development strategy for 2014-2030, a prerequisite for attracting related-EU funds. The Master Plan, approved by the EU Commission, was released for public debate until October 30, 2014.

“I have presented Romania’s General Transport Master Plan, which is a strategic document that provides all the steps that will be made between 2014 and 2030 to ensure a solid road, rail, water and air infrastructure to support economic development, to the two transport committees. It includes highways, expressways, trans-regional roads, shipping development in terms of ports, inland waterways for the Danube, maritime waterways, modal centers, as well as air and railway developments”, said Rus, quoated by Mediafax.

Expressways instead of highways

The GTMP brings some unexpected changes as regards the transport strategy, most of the projects foreseeing expressways instead of highways. According to the Ministry of Transport’s data, at the end of 2013 Romania had 644 km of highways and no expressway. The draft released today comprises road projects for additional 656 km of highways, which require estimated investments of about 6.6 billion euro (without VAT). The highways development projects incorporated in the GTMP are Sibiu-Brasov (103 km, estimated cost: 690 mln euro), Ploiesti-Comarnic (49 km, estimated cost: 310 mln euro), Gilau-Bors (177 km, estimated cost: 1.5 bln euro), Craiova-Pitesti (115 km, estimated cost: 870 mln euro), Comarnic-Brasov (54 km, estimated cost: 1.1 bln euro) and Brasov-Bacau (158 km, estimated cost: 2 bln euro).

Other road sections formerly projected as highways were included in the expressways map which will have nearly 2,230 km, investment costs being estimated at 17.5 billion euro (without VAT).

Ioan Rus said that there is no change of direction, though, when asked about this shift: “It’s not about replacing anything (...) It is only based on scientific analysis made by a company, probably the largest in the world, specialized in this field, which has made a scientific analysis on Romania’s traffic, the need for interconnectivity, strong support for economic development”, reads the same newswire.

The current form of the Master Plan additionally includes 2,674 km of trans-regional roads and 293 km of trans-European roads, which will require other 1.78 billion euro. 

No new railway projects

As regards the rail infrastructure, the GTMP draft does not include any new projects, but only rehabilitation projects. In the coming 16 years, the Government aims at running modernization projects for about 2,950 km of railway lines, the necessary funds coming to almost 13 bln euro. However, no new project is foreseen by the Master Plan, albeit both the Prime Minister, Victor Ponta, and the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Regional Development, Liviu Dragnea several times announced high speed rail projects in Romania subsequent to talks with Chinese representatives.

The reform package for the railway sector also proposes a smaller railway network for sustainability reasons – about 60 percent of the existing one, which accounts for 90 percent of demand. 

Water transport will be modernized

According to the GTMP draft, the water infrastructure sector will need investment of approximately 2.3 billion euro between 2014 and 2030, more than half of this amount being required to complete the project for connecting Bucharest with the Danube – 1.5 billion euro. Other 232 million euro will be allocated for modernizing inland waterways for the Danube, while some 550 million euro will be used for modernizing 10 ports.

Air sector: almost all the airports will be renovated

The transport development strategy as provided by the Master Plan targets the air sector, too. 13 of the 16 international or regional airports operating in Romania will be renovated in the coming years, shows the draft released on October 1, total investments amounting to 599 million euro.

The major project in terms of required funds (247 mln euro) concerns the Otopeni airport in Bucharest where will be built a new terminal by 2025. Apart from modernization works, the GTMP envisages intermodal centers in nine cities: Timisoara, Cluj-Napoca, Bucuresti, Bacau, Iasi, Suceava, Oradea, Turda, Craiova, which will need investments of 80.5 million euro.

For carrying out all these projects, the Government will need about 49 billion euro, however, according to the General Transport Master Plan draft, the existing financing sources cover only 71.25 percent of the total funds required.

The GTMP was designed based on the studies run by AECOM, the US company winning the corresponding contract two years ago. Once approved and enforced, the Master Plan should be reviewed every five years.