On Tuesday, November 26, after several hours of discussion on the implementation of the Rail Baltica project, the government did not even get to fully consider the information report of the Ministry of Transport (SM). The only clear message was that the project’s costs should be reduced as much as possible and that Rīga would not be included in the priority route, LSM.lv reports.
There was a conceptual agreement on a priority railway line from Lithuania to the Estonian border, bypassing the Latvian capital Rīga, and the completion of construction work at international stations.
The Transport Ministry has prepared an information report ” On the “Rail Baltica” project implementation scenario in the territory of Latvia “, where priority is given to the first stage of the project, which instead of a double track envisages the construction of a single track from the Lithuanian border to Estonia, as well as the establishment of a European standard gauge rail connection to one of the two Riga international stations – Rīga Central Railway Station or Rīga Airport, while before the completion of the first stage of the project, it is planned to connect the two Riga international stations within the existing railway infrastructure.
The discussions were long, sometimes even heated. Prime Minister Evika Siliņa (New Unity) was determined to agree on “at least something” at Tuesday’s cabinet meeting so as not to leave the room “empty-handed”. At one point, she even asked ministers to put their mobile phones in a box so that they could concentrate better on their work.
However, the information report prepared by the Transport Ministry was never fully examined. According to the Prime Minister, the detailed scenarios first need to be clarified – where construction work should start as a priority, and potential spending on activities not yet planned in Latvia should be stopped.
On Tuesday, the government gave conceptual approval to the idea of building the main line of Rail Baltica from the Lithuanian border to the Estonian border on a European track gauge of 1435 millimeters (mm) as a priority (Lithuania/Latvia border-Misa-Upeslejas-Vangaži-Latvia/Estonia border), starting construction work on the Lithuania border-Misa section and continuing it sequentially according to the available funding.
The Government also reached a conceptual agreement that the ongoing construction works at the Riga International Stations – Rīga Central Station South and Rīga Airport – would be completed to the minimum extent necessary to allow both passenger stations to be used for the existing 1520 mm passenger trains. Conceptual support has also been given to the Rīga Airport Station-Imanta connection so that both international passenger stations can start using the existing 1520 mm passenger trains.
This would mean that Rail Baltica high-speed trains would not arrive in the capital in the coming years. In this case, passengers would be able to travel from Rīga’s international stations to the Rail Baltica line on the existing trains.
The first phase of the Rail Baltica project described in the report envisages:
The Baltic joint venture RB Rail estimates that the Riga Upeslejas – Riga Central Station section would require €629 million, while the Misa – Riga Airport section would need €924 million.
The total cost of implementing the first phase of the cross-border link from the Estonian border to the Lithuanian border, using only the freight bypass via Salaspils, is €4.5 billion. The total cost of the two international passenger stations and associated track infrastructure is €875 million, while €133 million is needed for the construction of point facilities, including infrastructure maintenance points in Iecava and Skulte, a traffic control center for the Salaspils freight terminal, as well as four regional stations.
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