The demolition of the Concrete Bridge is postponed once again to mid-June, after the two-in-one election has passed. In the Municipality of Plovdiv, whose mayor Kostadin Dimitrov is also the city leader of GERB, they secretly decided not to deepen the tension among the voters, because the closure of the road connection between the “Central” and “South” districts will inevitably lead to bombastic traffic jams, especially on Komatevsko shose .
From the National Railway Infrastructure Company (NRI) they insisted on pushing the bridge as early as last year. During his visit to Plovdiv a few days before the local elections, the Minister of Transport, Georgi Gvozdeikov, stated in a straight tone that the Municipality should not approach the problem calmly, and if it continues to kick the ball, the state will lose millions of levs of European funding for the development and modernization of railway junction – Plovdiv.
In December, the deadline for the reconstruction of the Concrete Bridge was postponed to the end of January, then to March, later to after Easter (from May 9) and finally – to after June 10. The arguments for the latest postponement are that a large part of the students will finish the school year, the traffic will decrease, and the now fully completed “Moder – Tsarevets” underpass will be opened.
It sounds logical, but according to the signed agreement between NKŽI and the contractor company “Trace Group Hold”, one month is needed only for the removal of the old bridge, another five months – for the completion of the road facility above the railway area to the intersection of “Macedonia” blvd. “Kukush” street. This means that the construction works, planned for a total of six months, will ebb at best by Christmas, during which time the new school year will begin, followed by unfavorable rainy weather. Given that unforeseen circumstances almost always arise during construction, it is not excluded that the deadline for the new bridge construction will once again be extended.
“Solunska” has no prospects until the elections for the cars to go through the new underpass from “Moder” street along “Tsarevets”
Photo by Natasha Maneva
The Municipality of Plovdiv plans to start construction of a bypass collector and water supply network on the last section of Brezovsko shose immediately after Easter (May 8-9), which means that traffic must be stopped in the middle of the road, where archeology is located. For now, however, it is questionable whether the city administration will have the courage to stir up the electorate’s dissatisfaction with new traffic jams just before the vote. If this repair is delayed, there is a risk that the archaeologists will not finish the excavations before the winter season and the project will be suspended. Two teams of the Archaeological Museum were ready to start the survey as early as April 1 to take advantage of the season, but the date was postponed due to the caution of the administration.
The renovation of the Rogoshko road ends this week, and by May 1, the builders promise to allow traffic through the entrance to Plovdiv. The rest of the road to Adata will not be repaired for now with the motive of not creating traffic jams. According to this logic, in the previous mandate, when the pandemic and brutal inflation hit us, all construction should have stopped. But it continued.
There is no guarantee before the elections that traffic will go on the new “Moder – Tsarevets” underpass, which remained closed due to the slowness of the three Sofia companies. They are implementing the project of VK – Plovdiv for a bypass collector at the intersection with “Solunska” street, they are also going to dig on “Tsarevets” street at the intersection with “Hadji Dimitar” blvd. The next extended deadline they have been given is June 10, but it is questionable whether it will be met.
Until now, it is not clear whether for the parliamentary vote Plovdiv will receive a gift – BGN 8 million for the renovation of the Humanitarian High School. Not a single lev has been invested in the Municipality’s budget, the tension between parents and teachers is growing, and the eyes of the local government are once again focused on the central one.
The local government is in no hurry to raise service tariffs
The prices of administrative services, as well as of public transport in Plovdiv, are currently aging in the freezer, if one does not count the increase in the rents of municipal housing. At the beginning of the new mandate, the administration announced that it would be forced, even if partially, to raise the old tariffs, because otherwise it would be difficult to procure its own funds in the budget. As one of the examples, the issuance of building permits was mentioned, for which the bar was raised from levche to 5 leva in the last mandate. The new authorities reasoned – after the investors invest millions of BGN in their sites, it is proper to pay the Municipality more money for the service and to reinvest these revenues in the city infrastructure. At this stage, however, the measure is pending.
The price of the ticket in public transport, which is the lowest in the country – levche, is not touched either. The introduction of the electronic system should become a fact by the end of June, but until then there is no tariff for tickets and cards.
The taxi companies’ request for a price increase will probably remain for after the elections. The proposal has not yet been submitted to the Municipal Council for discussion at the upcoming session.
