Fri, Feb 10 2012

Road tolls coming in 2002

Thu, Mar 29 2001 15:00 CET

byNickolay Grigorov

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The Road Agency, a unit of the Ministry of Regional Development, announced the introduction of highway tolls on Tuesday.

"These tolls would be introduced gradually, between 2002 and 2007," said Antoni Slavinski, Minister of Transport and Communications, following a meeting with Gerhard Aurbach, Secretary General of the European Conference of Ministers of Transport.

According to Alben Rodopamov, head of the Road Agency, tolls in 2002 would be introduced on the Botevgrad-Sofia-Plovdiv-Orizovo highway. Between 2003 and 2005, tolls would be further introduced along these highways: Kulata-Sofia-Kalotina, Orizovo-Haskovo, Ruse-Byala-Pleven-Botevgrad, and Svilengrad-Kapitan Andreevo. Finally, after 2005, tolls would be introduced between Vidin and Botevgrad.

The issue of highway tolls was raised as Bulgaria prepares to start accession negotiations with the European Union on the transport chapter in early April. Bulgaria was obligated to introduce the fees as part of an agreement with the EU. In this respect, officials from the Transport Ministry announced that the tariff for highway tolls has already been drafted. Further, officials said that the transit of vehicles registered in EU member states would be free of charge.

According to Slavinski, experts would propose a procedure for charging the passage of foreign vehicles within a week. "Most probably this would be a combination between the purchase of stickers at the border check points, and a toll system located at the entries of the highways," Slavinski said.

In 1996, according to the U.S.-based Tourism Development Group, the overall length of the Bulgarian national road network was 36,711km. Approximately 33,000km were paved (asphalt concrete) with the remaining being gravel.

Bulgaria's vehicle fleet consisted of 1,707,023 passenger cars and 697,000 commercial vehicles and buses. Annually 493,000 cars and 397,000 commercial vehicles and buses pass through Bulgaria in transit. Approximately 85 per cent of this transit traffic passes through the Trans-European Motorway route, with a length of 370km.

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