Austria’s Alpina has resumed this month building the Corridor 10 section from Pirot to Dimitrovgrad with a bypass around Dimitrovgrad, southeast Serbia.
This was announced on Thursday by Koridori Srbije (Corridors of Serbia) public company.
Alpina continued the work on that section of the eastern leg of Corridor 10 through Serbia and promised to complete the work by the end of 2014.
The Austrian company therefore avoided the cancellation of the contract, which was a possibility because of breached deadlines.
Koridori Srbije warned Alpina that the contract would be cancelled after the World Bank announced it might withdraw the loan for that section because the deadlines had not been followed, that is they had been breached by more than 18 months.
Alpina is building the section of the motorway from Pirot (east) to Dimitrovgrad and a bypass around Dimitrovgrad, which is 23 km long, apart from the tunnels Pržojno Padina and Progon, which are being built by the Greek company Terna.
Alpina presented in early February a plan for the resumption of the construction, which states that the road and bridges in that section should be completed by the end of 2014.
Head of Koridori Srbije Dimitar Đurović told Tanjug earlier that Alpina had provided Koridori Srbije with a new plan for two sections of Corridor 10.
The plan states the section between Pirot and Dimitrovgrad should be completed by the end of 2013.
The entire run of the bypass around Dimitrovgrad, with 7 bridges, should be finished by the end of 2014.
Alpina officials claim that the deadline breaches were caused by citizen protests over the conditions of land expropriation, as well as a large slide that had not been discovered at the time the contract was signed.
The work on the bypass 8.6 km long started in April 2010 and the deadline for completion was 720 days.
The construction of the section Pirot-Dimitrovgrad 14.3 km long started in November 2010 with a deadline of 540 days.
Besides that, Alpina wants an additional EUR 74 million to build the section, while it was awarded that contract for 59.3 million, Koridori Srbije said.
The work on the section is funded from a loan from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, while the work on the bypass is funded by World Bank.
Source B92