European Railway News 02+03/97-1
Marco van Uden
European Railway News - February/March 1997
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Albania
A breakdown in civil order, which started in the south around Vlore in late
January, had spread to most of the country by mid-March. In late January
rail services were disrupted during demonstrations and rioting in Lushjne,
Rrogozhine and Peqin. From early February railway and ferry services were
suspended in the Vlore area. On 1st March the railway was reported as
blocked at Lushjne, and train services south of Rrogozhine were suspended.
The next day a State of Emergency was declared throughout the country.
Blockades were reported on roads and railway lines in the south of the
country, notably around Kavaje, Lushjne, Fier and Vlore. On 3rd March no
railway sevices operated at all and a curfew came into force from 2000 to
0700. On 4th March most railway services were restored, except routes from
Rrogozhine to Fier, Ballsh and Vlore where traffic remained suspended.
However on 13th March, the chaos spread to all areas of the country. The
port of Durres became lawless and beseiged by people trying to leave the
country - as Durres is the centre of the rail network it is unlikely that
any rail services ran at all from around 13/14th March. So far no reports
have emerged as to the extent of damage to railway infrastructure.
Despite the chaos it was reported that, following an agreement between
Albanian and Montenegran Railways, the cross-border freight link between
Bajza and Tuz has now re-opened to traffic with the first train running on
6th March.
Novoselle station has been closed to passenger traffic from February.
The Speed Limit on line from Shkozet to Kashar (Durres-Tirane line) has been
raised to 70 Km/h.
A new Albanian Railways website has been set up by Geoff Sarbutt and Frank
Valoczy at http://www.angelfire.com/ak/hekurudha/index.html
[contribution by Geoff Sarbutt]
Bulgaria
The electrification of the line from Sofia to Dragoman has been completed at
an estimated cost of 350 million BGL. BDZ now plans to electrify the line
Plovdiv - Svilengrad, scheduled to be completed by the end of 1997. The line
from Dimitrovgrad to the Turkish border will be electrified by the Russian
company Zarubezhtransstroy.
Currently, there are 8 freight trains running between Serbia and Bulgaria,
this is expected to increase considerably because many factories in Serbia
have agreed to receive raw materials shipped to the port at Burgas (BG).
BDZ has announced that it intends to join Eurofima. This means they will be
able to lease new(er) carriages to replace their ageing fleet of passenger
vehicles.
A through-train service from Sofia to Thessaloniki in Greece has been put
into service. It's only stops are at Blagoevgrad in Bulgaria and at one stop
in Greece. The travel time is about 4 hours.
A development program for BDZ is being drawn up by BDZ together with
consultants from KPMG and Daiwa. There is a possibility of Japanese
investment in BDZ.
BDZ has signed a USD $28.3 m contract with ADTranz to equip one of BDZ's
wagon works to rehabilitate ageing carriages. 100 coaches are to be
reconditioned by the end of 1998.
BDZ will transport 100,000 tonnes of grain which Poland decided to grant
Bulgaria during President Petar Stoyanov's visit. The Financial, Agrarian
and Transport Ministries will have to finance the carriage, and the Agrarian
Ministry will distribute the grain. Daily shipments of 2,000-2,200 are
scheduled. In March- April 55,000 tonnes of grain will be shipped and some
45,000 more in May.
[contributions by Frank Valoczy and from Pari Daily Business News]
Bulgaria/Macedonia
Bulgaria and Macedonia plan to make a joint application to international
financial institutions to get help for regional projects, in particular for
building roads, railways and telephone systems. This is the result from the
top-level meeting between both countries' prime ministers Sofianski and
Crvenkovski. Thursday's agreement will strengthen economic ties and
establish a free trade zone. After preparation of documents the Macedonian
PM is expected to return the visit in our country and sign the agreement.
The two Balkan countries will have to appoint a bank which will ease
financial transactions between them.
[contribution by Frank Valoczy from Pari Business Daily]
Czech Republic
On 9th January 1997 the office for General Representation of Railways of
Slovak republic(ZSR) in Czech city Praha was opened following earlier
preparations, while Czech railways'(CD)has had representation in the Slovak
city of Bratislava for about six months, but they have been waiting for
suitable person to lead the office. It was given to Mr. Milan Chupek, after
he left the function of General Director of ZSR. The office is determined to
better comunication and support of commercial relations between CD and ZSR
and their general directorates, although, thanks to common history and
hardly any language barrier, it is still in very good condition.
The Czech Railways' Board of Management met on 17th December 1996, the
General Director (Mr.Rudolf Mladek) entrusted the Director of Division of
Commerce and Transport(Mr.Vladimir Sosna) to prepare composing and issuing
of separate timetables for summer and winter seasons, effective season
1998/99, for unspecified time. It is probably connected with huge works on
main lines upgrading and its influence to regular traffic (diversions,
closures, temporary using of buses on the most complicated sections, etc.).
With begining of new timetable 1997/98 should start, probably for the first
time in Czech and Slovak history a new service for railway travellers - that
in many another countries has already been established for a long time - the
carrying of motor cars on the special wagons attached to passenger trains.
So far Czech railways have presented only one brief piece of information
about it, but more information could be deduced from new timetable's
advanced proposal. The cars should be carried with the overnight sleeping
car fast train "Hornad" going from Czech city Praha to east Slovakian
Kosice, but service is only for the town of Poprad, which is the main line
stop for the Slovak highest mountain area Vysoke Tatry (High Tatra). For a
start the offer is only for summer season (about April to September), once
for a week - Friday to Saturday night to Slovakia and from Sunday to Monday
back.
Monday 16th December 1996 saw the end of the closure of 19km long section
Brno-Blansko on Brno-Ceska Trebova which is the most complicated part of the
upgraded corridor Decin-Breclav (Berlin-Wien). This line wasn't
electrificated and contains lot of of curves. The Brno-Blansko section has
many tunnels, many of them had to be reconstructed or built again to be able
to be electrificated. The traffic was stopped here for 9 months and all
trains were replaced by buses, in last weeks of work one track of 7 km long
part of that section - between Adamov and Blansko was re-opened. Now both
tracks are available, but traffic on the whole line Brno-Ceska Trebova will
be still radically limited by reconstruction on the other sections of this
line.
>From Tuesday 4th 0.00 to Saturday 8th February 24.00 there was a strike on
Czech railways declared by Trade Union of Railway Employees (OSZ), which
includes most of Czech railways' employees. There are another 6 Trade-unions
on Czech railways. The Federation of Engine-drivers did not support the
strike, although they have been in strike-emergency, for of higher salaries,
since 27th January. Some engine-drivers supported the strike, and some of
them left thier membership of the Federation. The two another trade-unions
joined and three trade-unions supported the strike. Also some trade-unions
of coal-miners supported this strike. The strike was announced only about 35
hours before it started, as irrevocable and declared as for minimally 48
hours or longer, if the demands were not met.
The demands were 1) to recall the Czech railways' management, 2) to stop the
non-systemic steps, 3) to cease any sanctions against employees who joined
the strike 4) to make agreement with prime minister Vaclav Klaus, where the
government should promise to make conception of transportation policy. But
this last requirement was cancelled before the strike begun. Any claim for
higher salaries was not made.
Probably one of reasons for the strike was "Project of Directed Changes",
which includes privatisation of 20 percent of Czech railways' lines, lower
traffic on the other 20 percent of lines, dismissing of up to 40 percent
employees (reduction to 40 000 people).
Traffic started again during the morning of Sunday 8th January. During the
strike some regional bus lines were supported, both by Czech railways and by
bus-companies, although commuting people often used their own cars or shared
cars. A worse situation was on the long-distance routes, mostly during
Thursday and Friday when lot of students and working-people return home, on
some lines the buses could not cope. The strike brought difficulties to many
firms, mostly coal-mining and coal-using, such as coke-works or steel-works,
or firms dependent on timely supplies of material, which is transported on
rail (chemical industry), the others had problems with just-in-time
expedition of theirs products. On the other side the power-stations were not
at risk, because they have a permanent reserve of coal for about 5 weeks.
Estimated loss of each greater firm, which got into the troubles, was about
from ten to twenty million crowns every day of strike. Estimated loss of
whole Czech economy was more than one billion crowns. Because of strike the
trucks could exceptionaly run on Sundays. The general director constructed
some plans for running of some freight trains, but it was absolutely
inaccessible for trade-unions. Also because of some trains actually ran on
Czech Railways in the Ostrava region (coal-mines and steel-industry), where
is wide network of private industrial railways which are in some parts
connected by Czech Railways'lines. Unknown was information on the number of
striking employees, according to Management sources it was about 40-50
percent, while Trade Unions said more than 80 percent. Probably the true
number was much higher that the management said.
The final agrements provided :is is brief list of final four agreements :
1) By the end of timetable (end of May) the minister of transportation will
elaborate the transformation steps and will introduce it to the government.
These transformation steps should be consulted with trade-union.
2) By the end of April the Minister will introduce the analysis of completed
transformation steps. By two weeks after the strike there will be an audit
of nine causes, where the trade-unions have suspicions that there were some
cheats (as appointment of orders).
3) To draw conclusions and responsibility of bad managing of Czech railways.
To recall the general director- Rudolf Mladek - and his deputies. This was
not effected, so three weeks after end of the strike the trade-union again
threatened with the new strike. On Wednesday the 5.March the general
director resigned.
4) The requirement of any restrictions against the striking was the first
which the minister agreed, although during the strike the heads of all
stations got despatches ordering dismissing of all striking employees. About
four weeks after strike some of the heads, who didn't agree with this
despatch were dismissed, but after it was presented in the TV and news, the
dismissals were stopped. 3 days after end of the strike the ministers'
deputy for railways - Dalibor Zeleny - was also dismissed. The only reason
which were presented was, that he didn't realize expected role of middleman
between trade-unions and ministry.
Since this January the new Class 843 motorcoaches, produced by MSV Studenka,
have been in use for regular traffic. The first coaches has been allocated
to Sumperk (843.002), Ceska Lipa (843.010), Decin (843.011) and Chomutov
depots(843.004, 843.005), where they will replace the old Class 830 and 831,
or displace the newer Class 852,3 or 842 to other depots where they also
replace Classes 830 and 831. Ohers Class 843s are coming soon.
From 26th January the traffic on narrow gauge line from Jindrichuv Hradec to
Nova Bystrice (number 206 in the timetable) was suspended due to ts desolate
condition. This should be temporary until the end of this timetable (31th
May), but, of course, it's not sure, when or even if, this line will be
reopened again. From 1st January there is the same situation between
Mladotice and Cista stations on Mladotice-Rakovnik line(number 162 in the
timetable). On both lines replacement buses are operating. The similar
situation should start after the end of the timetable (31th May) on
beautiful mountain raillway between Louka u Litvinova and Moldava (number
135 in the timetable) also due to its bad condition (everything, including
two high steel viaducts and two tunnels needs expensive reconstruction) and
on part of line number 144 Chodov-Krasny Jez - between Horni Slavkov and
Krasny Jez (two viaducts, one tunnel).
On 29.January 1997 the general representation of Czech Rrailways was opened
in Moscow, Russia. The head of the representation became Mr.Premysl Nevrla.
The Czech Republic is investing $3.5B to refurbish its rail transportation
system. The big project is the Berlin-Prague-Vienna fast intercity route.
[contributions by Petr Kaderavek and Jack Tuszynski]