Two-day Geologic Workshop within the Czech-Saxon Cooperation Project

A two-day workshop of the project Cross-border cooperation for the development of railway transport Saxony – Czech Republic focused on geological survey took place on 8 – 9 October 2019. Under the geologists’ guidance, the project partners and invited guests visited gradually more than a dozen localities on both sides of the Czech-German border. Achieved results will help in preparing a high-speed connection between capitals of both countries.

The cross-border project is being implemented under the Programme for support of cross-border cooperation between the Czech Republic and the Free State of Saxony 2014–2020, co-financed by the European Union with Správa železniční dopravní cesty (SŽDC) as leader. The project’s objective is to intensify and deepen cooperation of institutions for the purpose of supporting and developing cross-border railway transport between states situated on both sides of Krušné hory (Ore Mountains), also in relation to the prepared and planned high-speed railway line from Dresden through Ústí nad Labem to Prague.

Implementation of the project’s activities has been going on since 2017 when its opening conference took place in June at Ústí nad Labem. Since then, experts from both sides of the frontier meet on regular workshops and conferences and inform each other on achieved results.

In accordance with the Project for the development of railway transport Saxony – Czech Republic, intense works of the common project team have been going on together with the German railway infrastructure manager DB Netz for the preparation of a new railway connection Dresden – Prague.

A complex evaluation of the first stage unambiguously recommended a path change of the new high-speed line between Prague and Dresden so that the new line assures direct servicing of the regional capital Ústí nad Labem where a new central passenger station for trains from all directions is going to be built. In the second stage of the study, partial sub-options of the proposal are being verified and evaluated. There are several dozens of technical and operational modifications that need to be verified such as the suggestion for new short connecting lines, alternatives for crossing Labe River at Ústí nad Labem or introducing new routes for passenger transport.

Besides the geological survey, the Project for the development of railway transport Saxony – Czech Republic concentrates also on transport and socio-economic analyses having as objective an improvement of the cross-border regions’ connection. The transport part of these analyses deals with maximizing benefits of the high-speed line Prague – Dresden for inhabitants near the frontier.

The geological workshop held in October focused on presenting partial findings of Czech and Saxon geologists right in the field. The project team together with other partners and press representatives visited problematic sites of the tunnel under Krušné hory boring and the sites of planned portals for this tunnel.

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