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According to a report by Politika in Belgrade, it is now confirmed that the first passenger train between Subotica and Szeged will start on October 23. The confirmation came from the highest level, as Foreign Trade and Foreign Affairs Minister Peter Szijjártó wrote on his Facebook page after a meeting with representatives of the Serbian government that Hungary and Serbia are connected by a thousand threads, one of which is passenger traffic. between Szabadka and Szeged, which will start on October 23. As he pointed out, the goal is to reduce the burden on the Horgos-Ruszki border crossing, one of the largest in Europe.
A long-awaited departure
Rail traffic between Zbadka and Szeged stopped in 2015, when Hungary closed its borders due to a large wave of migration.
But before that, rail transport was used only by a small number of passengers, as a means of transport had to be installed on the border between the two countries, because Serbian trains did not meet EU standards.
The renovation of the railway line began in October 2021, after the tracks from 1869 were removed, with the first train entering Szabadkára from the Szeged direction.
Now a completely new railway line has been built, where the planned speed of passenger traffic will be 120 kilometers and freight traffic 80 kilometers per hour.
The construction of the railway line itself was completed before the specified deadline, so freight traffic on this line has already started in August 2022, which will be a side solution for freight transportation until the construction of the high-speed railway line between Belgrade and Budapest.
But last summer, it was announced that passenger traffic would start only after one year, which greatly affected local residents, because the waiting time at almost all road crossings increased significantly.
The passport is checked on the train
From the point of view of efficiency and profitability, border control during interstate traffic has become a major issue.
Because if a train travels 46 kilometers between Sabadka and Szeged on an electrified railway, it will take no more than 40 minutes, but if the border check is delayed, all the benefits will be taken away.
The “auxiliary platform” at the Zatka freight station, where passengers board the “Szeged Express Train” (Source: Nikola Tombas, Politika)
According to the Politika report, Istvan Pastor, President of the Hungarian Assembly of Vojvodina, also participated in the discussions on border control, and suggested to the Belgrade government to reject the Hungarian proposal on border control.
The Hungarian idea was that there should be separate customs and passport checks on both the Serbian and Hungarian sides, which meant that for people from border settlements, such as those from Horgos, they would be able to reach Hungary via Subotica: in other words, they had to Entering Hungary first, they should have gone to Zapadka, and then, after customs and passport checks, they could have taken the train to Szeged in order to finally reach Hungary after passing through their starting point, Horgos.
According to the Belgrade newspaper, all the details are not yet known, but in the end it was agreed that there will be only one examination for passengers, which is on the train.
There is no timetable, first comes who will find
The timetable is not yet known, but it appears that the first train will depart from Szeged, and there will be one Serbian train and one Hungarian train each, as well as six international freight services.
There was some turmoil on the Hungarian side, as the contractor stopped all work at the end of June and left the construction site, and work was only resumed in August, which could be a particular problem regarding passenger reception.
According to Hungarian media reports, all technical requirements for overhead lines have not yet been met, so diesel instead of electric trains will be running for the time being, and it appears that noise protection is not ideal in some places.
Politika newspaper warned Serbian citizens, who will rush to Szeged on the first day of the new train, that shopping centers will be closed for the October 23 holiday.
At the moment, not everything is going smoothly in Zapadka, because work on the high-speed railway line between Belgrade and Budapest is in full swing there, and as part of this, the main station is also being renovated, so a small platform has been created that has been allocated at the freight station so Passengers are able to get off the train somewhere.
Making ourselves independent a Policy In this article, we cannot help but notice that this train between Subotica and Sejd takes place in a “Naski” way, which only we can do.
There will be a super railway, but here and there it still has to be extended and expanded, on the Hungarian side, diesel trains will help, and on the Serbian side, passengers will be squeezed for space at the freight station. But there will be a new train, hooray, hooray, go!
