ŽSR put into operation a new diagnostic train. Financing was provided by SIH
Bratislava, August 22 - Railways of the Slovak Republic (ŽSR) with the participation of Minister of Transport Pavel Lančarič and State Secretary Jaroslav Kmeť put into operation a new diagnostic train DV NDT. It will control the quality of the material and enable ŽSR to significantly increase the frequency of measurements. The financing of the project was realized in the form of a loan from Slovak Investment Holding (SIH).
For the first time in its history, ŽSR is getting a new and currently the most modern defectoscopic train in Central Europe. With the taking over and operation of that train, a new era in the provision of defectoscopy service for ŽSR begins.
The DV NDT diagnostic train is used for non-destructive testing of rails, which means that this train looks for both surface and internal defects of rails in a non-destructive way, which have arisen during operation. This technology was previously leased from Hungarian railways, which represented a financial burden for ŽSR.
"Just today, we are witnessing the handing over of an important tool for the Railways of the Slovak Republic, which will perform defectoscopy of the rails with its own diagnostic means and its own employees. Not only will the safety of operation on the railways be increased, thanks to this vehicle we will be able to detect and remove damage to the infrastructure at earlier stages, and thus reducing track maintenance costs," said Minister of Transport Pavol Lančarič.
ŽSR will also obtain additional data that can be compared over time and digitized the state of the railway infrastructure for the needs of further railway development.
"I see the main benefits of this project as an increase in the safety of railway operations, an increase in the level of diagnostics and a reduction in the cost of rail defectoscopy," said Jozef Veselka, Deputy General Director of ŽSR for Development and Informatics.
The project was financed by a loan provided by Slovak Investment Holding within the Operational Program Integrated Infrastructure in the amount of 14.4 million euros.
With this investment, Slovak Investment Holding deepened the very good cooperation with the Ministry of Transport of the Slovak Republic and organizations under its jurisdiction. Setting up an infrastructure project so that it could be financed from repayable resources was a challenging process. We are all the more pleased that by supporting the purchase of diagnostic vehicles we managed to contribute to the development of railway infrastructure in Slovakia and at the same time it was confirmed that financial instruments have their place in the field of transport as well.
ŽSR
ŽSR is the infrastructure manager, and according to the law, it is the railway track operator in Slovakia. The aforementioned implies an obligation to provide and operate national and regional railways and to organise transport on these railways for all transport operators per the transport policy of the state, without any discriminatory restrictions. In its portfolio, ŽSR manages railway lines (normal, wide and narrow gauge), catenary lines, railway tunnels and bridges, railway crossings and railway stations.
Slovak Investment Holding (SIH)
SIH is a 100 % state-owned joint stock company. Its primary mission is to support strategic public and private investments in Slovakia in the areas of infrastructure, energy efficiency, waste management, social economy, small and medium-sized enterprises, and cultural and creative industries. It draws funds for the implementation of investments from the European Structural and Investment Funds. SIH finances projects exclusively in a repayable form, i.e. through financial instruments and not through grants.