Plans for Czech 25-km railway tunnel threatened

Prague, Oct 30 (CTK) - The planned construction of the longest railway tunnel in Central Europe, a 25-km-long corridor through the Brdy hills from Prague, is threatened as the project has little chance of being subsidised from the EU funds, the daily Hospodarske noviny (HN) writes Friday.

The project is too expensive for Brussels to support it, Czech railway administration head Jan Komarek admitted to the paper.

The tunnel is to cost 33 billion crowns, according to estimates. To apply for EU money, the application needs to be sent by February.

In other words, there is no time to spare, HN writes.

The Czech Republic promised to modernise the railway from Prague to the town of Beroun, central Bohemia, that is to be part of the high-speed corridor from Prague to Nuremberg, Germany. The construction work should start in late 2012 at the latest for the country to meet its pledge.

Apart from the tunnel, there is also a different, more realistic plan: the reconstruction of the present railway to Beroun leading along the Berounka river and near the famous Karlstejn Castle, the paper writes.

However, the Czech railway administration is against this. Its spokesman Martin Halla said the modernisation would cause a massive wave of protests from the locals and environmentalists because noise barriers would have to be erected.

But even after the modernisation the trains would not be able to go 160 km/h, which is the required speed, Halla told HN.

The costs of the modernisation are estimated at 10 billion crowns.

The new railway has been prepared since the early 1990s. Some ten years ago, nine variants were worked out, most of them underground because the area next to the Czech capital is densely populated and negotiations with municipalities and thousands of property owners would be necessary.

Moreover, part of the Berounka valley known as the Czech Karst is protected landscape and the new corridor would have to go around it, the paper writes.

Next week, the Czech railway administration will have talks with JASPERS, the consulting office of the European Investment Bank.

Halla says JASPERS keeps on asking why the 25-km tunnel was chosen although earlier discussions have proved it is the only possible way.

JASPERS Vienna office rejects this view. Its head Jochen Schneider claims that the office simply wants to have evidence that this variant is the best.

Schneider said the task of his office is to increase the project's chance to get a subsidy from the EU structural funds.

Halla told the paper that the railway administration will try to convince the office that other variants are in fact impossible.