Engineering solutions company Fima has concluded a contract with Kauno Tiltai, AB, regarding the performance of works as part of the construction of the new Vilnius railway bypass. The company will reconstruct the traffic management systems at the existing first train road and the new second road that is currently under construction, install other engineering solutions, and upgrade station alarm systems. Engineering system modernisation and installation work will cover the Kyviškės-Valčiūnai-Vaidotai section and the railway stations operating in the area.

“An efficiently arranged transport system, including railway transport roads, is one of the contributing factors that determine the country’s economic growth potential. In Lithuania, the potential for railway freight transportation is high, and such projects, involving the construction of additional roads, allow for the possibility of enhancing cargo transport flows even more and employing the existing infrastructure more efficiently,” Vaidas Venskus of Fima Railway Solutions Department says.

In his words, the project stands out due to the fact that a railway with functional traffic management systems already operates in the Kyviškės-Valčiūnai-Vaidotai section, thus the company will not only install engineering systems for the newly constructed road but will also respectively reorganise the existing systems. “Although the bypass runs for 25 kilometres, the work will be performed in a 50 kilometre railway section since the bypass will be formed by two rather than one road,” Mr Venskus says.

The railway bypass construction project is implemented by the Lithuanian Railways and the main contractor for the implementation of the works is a consortium under the management of Kauno Tiltai, AB. The project is valued at a total of over LTL 200 million. The works are planned to be completed by 2014.

The goal of the railway bypass is to shift cargo train traffic further away from the central part of Vilnius and thus reduce city pollution as well as increase the permeability of railway transport roads and contribute to the improvement of the country’s railway line infrastructure. It is planned that after the implementation of technical and design solutions, the Vilnius bypass railway route will allow up to 80 km/h speed for cargo trains.

Modernisation of the old bypass and the construction of the new road are financed from the budget of the European Union (EU) Action Programme for Economic Growth 2007-2013. The EU’s contribution for the project will constitute 85% of the project’s value, while the remaining 15% will be covered by Lithuanian Railways.