Rail Baltica will not pass through all of Riga before 2030. Latvia is missing three billion euros for the completion of the line through its capital city. The city has been a major obstacle for the construction of the line, and the entire project risks losing one billion euros in EU funding if not completed on time.
A Latvian government memo has revealed that its transport ministry sees no way to complete the capital city’s section of Rail Baltica by 2030. The high-speed standard gauge rail line is supposed to connect the Baltics with the rest of Europe. However, there is no money to finance the construction of Rail Baltica on the right bank of the capital city in the direction of Estonia.
According to the confidential memo, the government is three billion euros short in financing. A revised plan to suppress Rail Baltica’s costs has not proven sufficient. The plan envisioned a restructuring of the construction of Rail Baltica into various stages, which allowed the country to reduce expenditures until 2030 by a third.
Alternative plan
Cutting costs by a third has not turned out to be enough. In the memo, the transport ministry makes clear that it sees no way to complete the Riga part of Rail Baltica before 2030 – the deadline for additional EU financing.
The ministry proposed an alternative solution to the government. It wants to connect Rail Baltica with two of the capital city’s stations, namely the airport and Riga Central Station. From there, trains would have to return in the opposite direction and circumvent the capital city. According to transport minister Briskens, it would increase the travelling time to Riga by approximately twenty minutes.
Deadline
Earlier, an EU Commission representative warned that Rail Baltica needs to be finished by 2030. The project needs to demonstrate tangible results to justify financing and to attract interested parties for tender contracts. If the mainline is not completed by 2030, the project could lose access to one billion euros in EU funding.
Subsequently, the Latvian transport ministry announced that it may initially bypass Riga to meet the 2030 deadline. The announcement came to the dismay of many, as Riga hosts half the country’s population and is its main economic centre.
The construction of the Latvian section of Rail Baltica has been plagued by issues. Inflation, high energy costs and limited availability of building materials and labour have increased the railway’s projected costs from 5,8 billion to 8 billion euros. Design, land expropriation and construction all face delays.
RailFreight Summit 2024
Are you interested in learning more about Rail Baltica and its logistical significance for the broader CEE region? Then the RailFreight Summit 2024, taking place between 15 and 17 April in Warsaw, Poland, is the perfect occasion to connect with industry professionals and dive deeper into the topic.
This year’s edition of the RailFreight Summit turns the spotlight on trending issues like the TEN-T expansion, connections with Ukraine, significant projects like RailBaltica and their potential for the creation of more efficient logistics corridors, Poland’s role as a logistics node and a performance assessment of intra-European and Eurasian services.
You can check the event’s programme here and secure your participation ticket here. Additionally, do not miss the chance to explore the networking and site tour possibilities that could provide excellent opportunities for boosting your business in Poland and the CEE region.
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