The Prime Minister said this year, the entire M44 motorway will be completed; it will connect Békés County with Hungary’s motorways. The M47 express road between Békéscsaba and Debrecen is under planning, while the M4 is under construction between Szolnok and Kisújszállás, all the way to Berettyóújfalu from where the border can be reached on four lanes already today, he pointed out.
He added that in addition to the railway line section of 30 kilometres now completed, the next railway line between Szeged and Kiskunfélegyháza was also under construction.
Three motorways and – the Budapest-Belgrade railway line included – three railway lines are being built, the Prime Minister listed, observing that on the line now completed trains can travel at a speed of 160 kilometres an hour instead of the previous maximum speed of 100 kilometres an hour.
He said the section extending to Brasov is also being built on the Romanian side, and when everyone completes everything they pledged to complete, the journey from Budapest to Brasov, meaning to the foothills of the Carpathians, will be shortened by five hours.
He recalled that the writer László Krasznahorkai from Gyula has a novel, the story of which takes place in a settlement which “seems very much like Békéscsaba,” and is about trains that never arrive, incompetent, flustered station masters, frustrated passengers and dilapidated stations.
With the refurbishment of the Lőkösháza railway section, this has changed: the novel is the past, and the future is here. There are no disappearing trains anymore, there are no dilapidated stations and there are no irritated engine drivers either, he said, pointing out in continuation that instead there are modern, fast trains and beautiful stations.
He said Lőkösháza, the South of the Great Plain and Békés County have a major problem in the form of the country borders drawn more than a hundred years ago, and this emerges at the end of the Lőkösháza railway station.
Mr Orbán said 105 years ago we Hungarians were intended the fate of “remaining frozen” as at the time, Hungary and Békés County were detached from the region extending to the foothills of the Carpathians, and as a result, they were deprived of the natural blood circulation which had previously filled the world here with life.
In the context of the job creation chapter of the Great Plain programme, the Prime Minister reminded his audience of the announcement made by Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó last week to the effect that with grants worth HUF 49 billion from the Hungarian government, the Singapore-based Vulcan Shield Global would build a factory in Békéscsaba from an investment totalling HUF 280 billion, creating 2,500 jobs.
In continuation, he said the opposition’s economic policy expert said that the government is giving businesses too much money. If we had not given this HUF 49 billion, there would not be 2,500 jobs in Békéscsaba, not a single one would have been created, he pointed out.
He added that “Airbus is already here in Gyula,” and in Kecskemét, too, they would shortly be inaugurating the second large Mercedes factory. In Szeged, BYD is in the process of commissioning a plant employing thousands of workers, while the BMW factory in Debrecen will be inaugurated on Friday.
He said thanks to the new factories to be built in the region, during the period ahead, fifty thousand new jobs will come into being in total, direct and indirect jobs included.
He drew attention to the fact that they are preparing to create a so-called ‘Békéscsaba-Debrecen-Nagyszalonta’ economic region in the next fifteen years.
The government of Hungary is working hard “so that the Hungarian people can finally live in peace, security, continued prosperity and with faith in the future,” he underlined.
The project has been implemented with the aid of EU grants worth HUF 186.219 billion net, as part of Hungary’s Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF).
The project covers a section of 30 kilometres, as part of which traffic safety has been enhanced, while environmental emission levels have been reduced with multiple new crossings at different levels, equipped with warning lights. The modernisation enables the introduction of the ETCS 2 system on the European section operating as part of the so-called TEN-T corridor.
The overhead line system and power supply have been modernised on the entire trackage; new vehicle diagnostics systems and electronic signalling equipment have been installed with 74 electric points.
The stations have been refurbished in Szabadkígyós, Kétegyháza and Lőkösháza, and a noise barrier has been erected on a section of 5.5 kilometres. The refurbished old buildings in Lőkösháza have undergone a change of functions, platforms with access for persons with reduced mobility and rain protection, underpasses and lifts have been built, and P+R and B+R parking facilities have also been created. As part of the refurbishment project in the station square, a new roundabout has been built where buses can turn.
