Economic growth, elimination of bottlenecks, less pollution and last but not least, fast transport from one point to another. These are only few advantages of the cities where high-speed transport is already a fact. This could actually be seen in many European countries with long-standing tradition, where companies such as Alstom, Bombardier or Siemens developed projects and launched innovative products. And this also happened in period of crisis, when most players, although reviewing their budgets, didn’t give up projects. “The company’s high-speed activity is under constant growth following its long-standing experience and advanced technology. A project of this kind will always stimulate economic development in the region where it is implemented”, declared Gabriel Stanciu, General Manager Alstom Transport for Romania and Bulgaria. According to him, Alstom currently has almost 30 years of experience in very high-speed rail transport and 50% of the trains now running at over 300 km/h in the world have been manufactured by Alstom. The area that Stanciu now represents, Romania and Bulgaria, is still far away from building such a network. “There are no projects. And should the region develop, as rumours say it, I believe big cities need to be connected by a separate high-speed line in order not to compete with European corridors. It would be much more efficient in terms of transport”, he explained. Nowadays, Alstom is the only manufacturer developing three rail very high-speed platforms: TGV Duplex, a two-levelled platform that operates on a daily basis in France at speeds of up to 320 km/h and the single level platforms Speedelia and AGV. And the company’s plans don’t end here, as Alstom keeps an eye on every high-speed line to be built in the future.
A new potential section: Budapest-Bucharest-Constanţa
A few months ago, the Romanian Prime Minister, Emil Boc, said that one of the country’s long-term objectives is building a fast train line by extending the already existing Paris-Strasbourg-Bratislava line with a new section, Budapest-Bucharest-Constanţa. Easy to say, hard to do. This is what the majority of those developing their business in the country would say. Especially since, as PM Boc said at the time, one of the main problems is financing such a project which is estimated at several billions of euros. The idea of building such a line also came up several years ago, circulated by officials from the Bucharest Government.
However, back then nothing happened. And the declarations of some market analysts, that Romania is at a 10-15 years’ distance from other European countries when it comes for such a project, are not at all exaggerated. “Any plans for a high-speed development in Romania could be a significant step forward for this country’s railway sector. Moreover, such a major project could have a positive impact in the development of an efficient and eco-friendly rail transport”, believes Bernhard Rieder, Director, Communications Passengers, Bombardier Transportation.
His opinion reflects in Spain or France’s situation, two countries that compete in high-speed networks. It is worth mentioning that Spain has recently launched a new 435-km rail connection between Madrid and Valencia, thus becoming holder of the longest high-speed network (2,000 km) and overrunning France (1,900 km). If calculated based on the speed that things are moving in this part of Europe, one could say that projects will not delay in the East-European region either, where the only current problem seems
to be financing.
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