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€5 million to ease traffic, pollution in Sopot
A €5 million loan from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to the Polish city of Sopot will help relieve traffic congestion and reduce pollution by financing the installation of traffic-activated signalling and the construction of an underground pedestrian passageway beneath the busy Niepodleglosci Avenue, connecting the urban centres of Gdansk and Gdynia.
The loan highlights the EBRD's growing involvement in financing municipal infrastructure investments in Poland, where the Bank has already loaned financing of around €170 million to four cities: Krakow, Wroclaw, Gdansk, and Bydgoszcz. Projects are also being considered in Rybnik, Warsaw, Poznan, Lodz and Szczecin, and this loan may act as a launch pad to develop similar projects in other central European municipalities to address growing congestion and pollution problems.
The Bank's financing will be in the form of a direct municipal loan, without sovereign or commercial-bank guarantees. Additional funding from the EU's PHARE facility was used to help prepare the project.
The EBRD is working closely with the Polish authorities to find ways in which the Bank can provide support to smaller cities in Poland. "These municipalities often find it more difficult to attract commercial loans or grants to finance their infrastructure development," said Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz, Vice President at the EBRD. "It is important for Poland -- and for its accession to the European Union -- that its smaller municipalities catch up quickly with the major urban centres."
With a population of 43,000, Sopot is a small but popular holiday resort town that benefits from its proximity to the industrial centres of Gdansk and Gdynia. The city has invested heavily in reducing pollution levels by converting district heating coal burners into gas. The city is also committed to addressing the growing issues of traffic-related pollution. Its location between major economic centres and the influx of visitors, which in summer reaches 2 million, makes this task particularly difficult. Robust economic growth in the last 10 years has spurred the car ownership in this "Tri-city" area to 320 cars per 1,000 people, almost treble the number a decade ago.
The project will be closely coordinated with the EBRD's Gdansk Urban Transport project, a €12 million loan signed earlier this year to improve the city's public transportation by helping to refurbish trams, rehabilitate key sections of tram track and introduce electronic ticketing.
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