July 9 (SeeNews) - Croatian railway infrastructure operator HZ Infrastruktura plans to invest 9.3 billion kuna ($1.4 billion/1.6 billion euro) in various projects from 2019 to 2023, with 59% of financing coming from the European Union, local media reported on Tuesday.
The investment cycle comprises 18 projects, of which four are already in progress, news portal Vecernji.hr reported, quoting information from HZ Infrastruktura.
Out of these four projects, works on the Gradec – Sveti Ivan Zabno railway section worth 193.5 million kuna are closest to completion. The section is expected to open for traffic on September 1. It is the first new railroad built in Croatia in the past 50 years. The project was launched in 2015.
Works on another railway section, Dugo Selo - Krizevci, face a two-year delay due to the bankruptcy of subcontractors and unresolved property rights, among other issues. This project was launched in 2016, and is expected to cost 1.2 billion kuna. Its completion is scheduled for February 2022.
In addition, the company has also began works on the Zabok - Zapresic section as part of a 529 million kuna project, and is involved in the 220.7 million kuna development of a multimodal platform at the Adriatic port of Rijeka and its connection to the Adriatic Gate container terminal.
At present, four other big projects are in the phase of public procurement.
One of them is the 297 million kuna project for the Krizevci - Koprivnica - state border section in northern Croatia, where several complaints concerning the tender documentation have been submitted. The EU's Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) is providing 85% of the project financing.
Another project is the Vinkovci - Vukovar railroad section, where two appeals have been filed with the state commission in charge of procurement control, after HZ Infrastruktura chose as winning bid the 376.3 million kuna offer of Spanish civil engineering company Comsa.
HZ Infrastruktura and Croatia's Rijeka port authority last week hired Slovenian civil engineering company SZ-ZGP in a 31.6 million euro deal for reconstruction works at the cargo part of Rijeka port's railway network and for the construction of an intermodal terminal at the Zagreb Deep Sea Container Terminal (Zagreb DSCT).
In the recently completed tender for the construction of the Zagreb – Savski Marof railway section, HZ Infrastruktura received only one bid - from a consortium of Austria's Swietelsky and Croatia's Dalekovod worth 379 million kuna.
However, the bid exceeds the projected value of works, which will be financed with the proceeds of a World Bank loan, therefore the company will announce its decision after completing consultations with the bank.
(1 euro = 7.39325 kuna)