After two years the inhabitants of the distant Sofia district “Nadezhda” will reach downtown in 7 minutes. This will become possible thanks to the forthcoming expansion of the subway with funds from the EU. Recently the EC announced that it would give 157 million euro to Bulgaria in order to construct the second Sofia subway line. This sum will cover 80 per cent of the cost of the new line. The remaining will be from the state budget.
The news that the EC is providing the funds came less than a month after the official opening of the first completed “ray” of the subway, which connects the Eastern and Western part of the capital. This became possible after the two constructed parts were joined in the city centre. Now everyone can cross the capital, where some two million people live, for about 20 minutes, thus avoiding the extremely heavy traffic and much hated jams. The construction of the so far one and only subway line took long years full of complex problems and nerve tearing moments. The date when the subway was to start running was postponed several times.
Due to the ever-increasing road traffic and the series of suburbs springing up in the outskirts of the capital traffic problems got worse in the old city centre where roads are narrow. Therefore the Bulgarian government approved a master plan for the construction of a subway system way back in 1979. But the heavy financial crisis at the end of the 80s and the beginning of the 90s of the 20th century hampered the building of the subway. Because of that the first line with a length of 6.4 km was opened in 1998. Nearly three years after that the trains began to stop at the “Serdica” station in downtown Sofia. People were more than glad to be able to move swiftly from the “Obelya” and “Lyulin” districts to the city centre. But the inhabitants of the Eastern districts had to wait several more years to acquire this means of transport. At the beginning of September PM Boyko Borisov opened the newest part of the subway. Its construction cost $ 98 million and the greater part of the money was provided by the Japanese bank for International cooperation and development. At present Sofia is proud that it has completed the construction of the first subway line. Connecting the Western and the Eastern parts of the city it is 18 km long and has 14 especially designed stations along the way. At peak hours the trains are at two-minute intervals. The operational speed of the trains is 80 km per hour. Average distance between stations is 1100 m; platform length - 120 m.
On a busy work day one of the newest stations – that at the Sofia University “St. Kliment of Ohrid” is full of people. One of them is 39-year old Ani Stoyanva, inhabitant of “Obelya”. For Radio Sofia she shared that not long ago it took her two hours a day to go to and from work.
“I started using the subway the minute it began running. Now that the stations have increased I find that I am expanding my tours of the city more and more. All by neighbours are extremely happy to have this means to traverse the city in such a short time”, says Ani Stoyanova.
“The stations are new and clean and I think we should do everything possible to keep them this way” says 33-year old Radoslav Raichev and adds:
“Sofia needed this convenience. I personally remember when they first started digging for the future subway. That was a very long time ago. It is a real pleasure now to be able to cross the city in 20 minutes. I sincerely hope that the other lines will soon be ready, so that the capital will have this modern means of transport. I am impressed how the stations have been designed so as to preserve the ancient spirit of our city and at the same time have a contemporary look”.
Written by: Veneta Nikolova
English version: Ivaila Bozhanova
http://www.bnr.bg/RadioBulgaria/Emis...909_subway.htm
The Sofia subway expands
Linear Mode
