Final agreement on fee for bridge near Beska by end-October 2012?

(Bridge near Beska)

A whole year has passed since the new bridge across the Danube near Beska was opened for traffic, and the price of its construction is still unknown. Unofficially, the price could be rounded up in some fifteen days, when the project investor - the public company Putevi Srbije, and the Austrian construction company Alpine are expected to agree on the costs of the construction. However, a similar announcement has been heard before, but no agreement has been reached to date.

At a ceremony marking the opening of that bridge for traffic, Minister of Infrastructure Milutin Mrkonjic and Putevi Srbije CEO Zoran Drobnjak hinted that the total cost would exceed the agreed sum of EUR 37 million, but we still don't know by how much. Alpine claimed in public that the construction cost a bit over EUR 100 million, while the investor offers slightly more than a half of that amount.

According to procedures, the consulting company Scott Wilson should have solved this problem and determine the final price by looking through the papers together with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, which approved the loan for the bridge construction. In case one of the parties is not satisfied with the final price they determine, the dispute will be transfered to an international independent competent body.