In May it is Beograd only the first of the 25 purchased blue Turkish ones arrived tram Bozankaja brand, and problems are already visible. The rails on the streets of our capital are too narrow for this vehicle. Actually, as a source from eKapija unofficially said GSP, Bozankaja is wider than other rail vehicles in Belgrade, and this will cause problems in everyday traffic.
"The width of these trams is such that when they come from opposite directions in the future, they will not be able to pass at all intersections at the same time, but the tram from one direction will have to let the one from the other pass first, and only then continue," explained the source of eKapija, reports Beta.
He points out that this is an omission and an oversight that should not have happened during the procurement process for the purchase of new trams for the needs of GSP Belgrade.
Additional problems
As eKapija learns, the new tram is not so new anymore, because it has already suffered the first damages. However, the reason is not the bad management of the driver employed in our city transport, but the Turkish representative who participates in the testing and training of GSP employees. According to the sources of this portal, last weekend on the new tram, the blinker and external camera were damaged.
In the meantime, a new problem appeared, it was determined that during the last reconstruction of the intersection in Nemanjina, at the corner with Resavska, the distance between the rails was narrowed. Thus, on this part of the tram route, the rails will be too narrow for the already too wide Bozankaja.
Traffic engineer and president of the Centar GSP Belgrade union, Ivan Bankoviฤ, told eKapija that there are several points of contention regarding the new tram, one of the key ones being its width.
"The new Turkish tram is wider than any other. To be precise, the width of the CAF tram is 2,2 meters, the Divag tram from the Swiss donation is 2,3 meters, and the newly arrived tram is 2,4 meters wide. At the start, I can tell you that in addition to the intersection of Nemanjina and Savski Square, the intersection of Bulevar Kralja Aleksandra and Beogradska Street is also a problem, and there will be possible problems in some other sections as well," warned Bankoviฤ.
As he explained, this means that there will be a big challenge at larger curves and intersections, especially due to, as he stated, the geometry of the rounded end of the module, if the infrastructure is not adapted to new vehicles, which would imply technical corrections to the existing infrastructure.
Overpriced procurement and contested tender
Nikola Jovanoviฤ, director of the Center for Local Self-Government (CLS), confirmed for "Vreme" the disproportionality of the new trams and Belgrade's streets.
"It is absolutely true that the Turkish Bozonkaja tram is wider than all the existing trams in Belgrade and that it is not ideal for our city. The width of the tram was specified in the tender (2.4m), because the tender was designed for Bozankaja, so the technical specifications were literally copied from their catalog," explains the interlocutor.
As he says, "CLS warned months in advance that the tender was rigged and that it was known in advance that the Turks would win, but apparently the competent authorities did not have enough awareness to investigate this."
He also points out that no one denied what they published.
"It turned out at the tender that Bozankaja was the only bidder, although Siemens asked some questions," says Jovanoviฤ.
CLS previously pointed out the exorbitant price of new Turkish trams. Now Jovanoviฤ has confirmed the results they conducted for "Vreme".
"For the budget that was spent in Belgrade for the purchase of the first 25 new trams, which are starting to arrive, we could have received as many as 10 more trams, the analysis of the Center for Local Self-Government shows. The city of Belgrade paid 25 million euros for the incoming 67.3 new trams of the Turkish brand Bozankaya, or 2.7 million euros per piece, and that without VAT. At the same time, Romania's Timisoara paid 17 million for 33 similar trams of the same brand EUR, i.e. EUR 1.9 million per piece.
Modernization with an outdated model
Jovanoviฤ explains to "Vreme" that the Turkish Bozankaya tram is not represented anywhere else in Europe except Romania, so it was difficult to estimate by how much the price was too high. That's why they analyzed the procurement of a similar, somewhat superior tram model for Timisoara from last year. For him, it turned out that this model that we purchased cost Romanians less than us.
When asked why, in our desire to modernize city transport, we chose a model that is no longer used anywhere except in Romania, he replied that "it's classic corruption", which is the main problem, and the inadequate width of the new tram is just an additional circumstance.
"When you arrange corruption outside of the foreseen legal mechanisms that allow everyone to compete equally for a public job, it doesn't matter what the technical characteristics are, not even the price. The only thing that matters is that you create as large a margin for corruption as possible. The city authorities and the mayor's office made an agreement 'under the grain' with the Turkish manufacturer," says the interlocutor.
Expensive wide trams carry expensive maintenance
Jovanoviฤ explains to "Vreme" that despite the wider width of the trams, they can still be used, but he confirms the assumptions that it will be challenging.
"It does not mean that they are unusable for trams. It just means higher maintenance costs for GSP, because they need to maintain several types of trams. It also potentially means that, if two Bozenkayas meet at some points, there may be contact," the CLS director points out.
When asked if we can return the purchased vehicles, he says that we should. However, the chances of that are slim.
"Some responsible city government would return those trams, but not ours, because they took commissions. And we also specified those characteristics in the tender," concludes the interlocutor.
