A3 motorway (Romania)


The A3 motorway is a partially built motorway in Romania, planned to connect Bucharest with the Transylvania region and the north-western part of the country. It will be 596 km long and will run along the route: Ploiești, Brașov, Făgăraș, Sighișoara, Târgu Mureș, Cluj-Napoca, Zalău and Oradea, connecting with Hungary's M4 motorway near Borș.
As of December 2018, there are roughly 138 km in service: the Bucharest – Ploiești motorway, the Câmpia Turzii – Nădășelu segment and the Iernut – Ungheni segment.
In January 2015, the motorway section between Câmpia Turzii and Târgu Mureș was awarded for construction. It was divided into two larger segments, with a total of five lots, which sum up to 56.5 km. After the opening of the Iernut – Ungheni segment in December 2018 and the signing of the contract for the Târgu Mureș – Ungheni segment in May 2020, there are 38.0 km remaining under construction.
Additional works on the Nădășelu – Borș section were auctioned between 2018 and 2019, with one contract awarded for the Biharia − Borș segment in December 2018 and the winners of some of the other bids still pending to be awarded.
Furthermore, construction works are being performed on a 6.3 km segment between Râșnov − Cristian, part of the Comarnic − Brașov section, awarded for construction in October 2017.

Bucharest – Brașov section

This motorway section will cross the Carpathian Mountains along the Prahova Valley. It will also provide access to the future Terminal 2 of the Henri Coandă Airport and to the future Bucharest – Chișinău motorway, via the Ploiești South-East interchange.
It was split into three larger sections: the Bucharest – Ploiești section, the Ploiești – Comarnic section and the Comarnic – Brașov section.

Bucharest – Ploiești section

Works on the Bucharest – Ploiești section started on 15 March 2007 and were due to be completed by October 2012.
The first segment, between Bucharest – Moara Vlăsiei, was built as a six-lane set of carriageways to accommodate commuting and holiday surplus traffic. It was built by the Italian joint venture between Impresa Pizzarotti and Tirrena Scavi, while the second segment, between Moara Vlăsiei – Ploiești, was built by the Romanian companies Spedition UMB, Pa&Co Internațional and EuroConstruct Trading '98. Total construction cost of this section was estimated at 450 million euro.
The section between Bucharest Ring Road – Ploiești was opened on 19 July 2012, while the rest of the section towards downtown Bucharest remained to be completed.
The Bucharest – Bucharest Ring Road segment is part of the Bucharest – Moara Vlăsiei subsection and was built under separately awarded contracts, as the one with Impresa Pizzarotti was terminated. It starts with a roundabout at the junction between the Fabrica de Glucoză and the Petricani Street, crosses over the Balta Saulei Lake, intersects the Gherghiței Street with a second roundabout, then continues northbound, crossing over the CFR Line 800, the Popasului Street and the Bucharest Ring Road, as well as the railroad again.
On the Popasului Street – Bucharest Ring Road segment works have started in April 2012, whereas on the Petricani Street – Popasului Street segment works have constantly been delayed, partly because of remaining unfinished expropriations, until the contract was finally terminated in February 2015.
In December 2015, the construction works of the first 3.3 km of the motorway, the Bucharest Ring Road junction and the still under construction Moara Vlăsiei exit were awarded to the joint-venture between Aktor and EuroConstruct Trading '98, for a cost of 129.2 million lei. They were planned to be completed by 2018, but the progress remained slow as of June that year. The entire segment from the Petricani Street to the Bucharest Ring Road was opened on 14 December 2018. The media has highlighted the facts that the motorway ends with a stoplight and it has a roundabout on its route, something unique in Romania, and widely regarded this segment as an "urban motorway".

Ploiești – Comarnic section

The Ploiești – Comarnic section has been in pre-feasibility phase and its profitability is being considered. It is complemented by a relatively settlement-free section of the parallel national road DN1.

Comarnic – Brașov section

Works on the Comarnic – Brașov section, the most difficult segment of the motorway, were due to begin in 2010 and take around four years to complete, but the French–Greek consortium Vinci–Aktor denounced the contract and construction was canceled. Total construction cost of this section was estimated at 1.2 billion euro.
The segment was re-tendered as a concession contract in February 2013. It has been awarded in December 2013 to the joint venture between Vinci, Strabag and Aktor, for a period of 29 years, with an estimated construction cost of 1.8 billion euro. This section of the motorway would have three twin tunnels, with a total length of 19.4 km, at Sinaia, Bușteni and Predeal, and four interchanges, at Comarnic, Bușteni, Predeal and Râșnov. The route would follow the river valley until Posada, where it would cross on the opposite side of the river and would run along the mountain range until Sinaia, from where it would then run nearly straight until Azuga, crossing through two twin tunnels that would bypass Sinaia and Bușteni, before crossing again to the eastern side of the river. According to media reports, works were expected to begin in April 2014, but they were still pending, due to financial arrangements and the environmental certificate. According to the same reports, they had to be finalized in 2017.
As of 19 June 2015, the concession had been canceled.
As of 15 October 2015, section 1 and section 5 at the ends of the Comarnic – Brașov section were separately tendered. For section 1, a bid by Spedition UMB and Tehnostrade remained the only one, while the other tender was leaning towards a consortium led by the Spanish construction company Copisa. However, as of October 2017, after the termination of challenge procedures, only the Râșnov – Cristian segment was awarded for construction, to the Cypriot company Alpenside. The contract, which includes a 3.7 km connecting road, is worth 25.8 million euro and should take 6 months for planning and 18 months for execution. The bid for the Comarnic Sud – Comarnic Nord section had been canceled by February 2017, as the only bid was not in accordance with the terms.
On 16 October 2018, the motorway Ploiești – Comarnic – Brașov was once again tendered, as a public–private partnership, that would take 24 years and have an estimated cost of 1.36 billion euro. The Romanian state would contribute with 25%, while the private partner would contribute with 75%. As of 17 December 2018, the tender's deadline, there were five companies or joint-venture interested. The project received criticism from the NGO called Asociația Pro Infrastructură for lacking details of major importance. In October 2019, it was announced that the joint-venture selected for the construction works was China Communcations Construction Company – Makyol Insaat Sanayi Turizm. The project was, once more, cancelled in the first quarter of 2020, by the newly elected government, in favor of a new future tender, based on European funds.

Brașov – Oradea section

This motorway segment, known as the Transylvania Motorway, was split into three parts, with several subsections: the Brașov – Târgu Mureș segment, the Târgu Mureș – Cluj-Napoca West segment and the Cluj-Napoca West – Oradea West segment.
The segments in service of this section of the motorway are the Câmpia Turzii – Nădăşelu segment, under several openings between December 2009 and September 2018, and the Ungheni – Iernut segment, opened on 12 December 2018. The Suplacu de Barcău – Borș segment has been under construction since 2004, but the contract was terminated in May 2013, with the construction progress around 50%. Additional works are being performed on the Iernut – Câmpia Turzii segment, since February and March 2015, and on the Biharia − Borș segment, since December 2018.

Bechtel controversy

The entire section was originally scheduled to be built by the American company Bechtel Corporation together with its regional partner Enka of Turkey. The contract was awarded in 2004 to the Bechtel Corporation by the Social Democrat Prime-Minister Adrian Năstase without an open bidding process, invoking "national security" as an excuse. The estimated construction cost was 2.8 billion € in 2003 and it rose to 4.7 billion € in a 2007 estimate. Although officially the deadline was set for 2013, the final cost and finalization date remained unknown.
As per the Romanian ministry of transportation, Anca Boagiu, the original contract was highly disadvantageous to the Romanian side. Following the contract renegotiation that occurred in June–July 2011, Bechtel agreed to lower the building cost per kilometer by 50% down to 6.9 million euro. Also it was decided that the American company will build only two segments, leaving all the other segments of the motorway open for tendering.

Construction progress

Câmpia Turzii – Cluj-Napoca West – Nădășelu section

The official groundbreaking ceremony for the Transylvania Motorway was held near the village of Vălișoara on 16 June 2004. On 1 December 2009, the Turda – Cluj-Napoca West segment was opened for traffic, followed on 13 November 2010, by the Câmpia Turzii – Turda segment. As of January 2012, works were being performed only on the Suplacu de Barcău – Oradea West segment, with 17 km planned to be opened on 15 November 2012 and other 18 km on 30 August 2013. However, not much progress was visible on this segment by August 2012, and the bridge across the Someșul Mic river, part of the Câmpia Turzii – Cluj-Napoca West segment, was also yet to be built. In May 2013, the contract with the Bechtel Corporation was terminated through mutual agreement. The construction status of the Suplacu de Barcău – Borș segment is reportedly at 50%.
An additional 8.7 km segment, between Cluj-Napoca West and Nădășelu, was tendered in August 2012, and awarded to the joint venture between Spedition UMB and Tehnostrade in April 2013. Works on this segment were scheduled to begin as late as six months after signing the contract and take one year and a half to complete. The segment would act as a bypass for Cluj-Napoca, the second most populous city in the country, on the route towards Zalău and Baia Mare. The contract was reportedly terminated in June 2013, before any construction works started, but works began in the summer of 2014, with an expected opening date in April 2016. As of April 2017, the segment was largely completed, but unusable due to the fact that the bridge across the Someșul Mic river connecting with the Câmpia Turzii – Cluj-Napoca West segment was not completed. A contract for the remaining works to this bridge was signed in September 2017, and they were expected to be completed by August 2018. The works were finally completed in September 2018. The contractor was the Italian company Tirrena Scavi.

Târgu Mureș – Câmpia Turzii section

The section from Târgu Mureș, via Ogra, to Câmpia Turzii, with a length of 52 km, was tendered in 2014, and for four out of five lots, contracts have been signed at the end of February and early March 2015. Construction was set to take between 12 and 16 months, depending on the lot.
The Târgu Mureș – Ogra lot 1 was awarded to the joint-venture Lemacons - Vega 93 - Arcada Company, for a cost of 179.8 million lei. The Târgu Mureș – Ogra lot 2 was awarded to the joint-venture between Strabag and Straco Grup, for a cost of 251.3 million lei. The Ogra – Câmpia Turzii lot 1 was awarded to the joint-venture Geiger Transilvania - Wilhelm Geiger GmbH & Co. KG, for a cost of 55.8 million lei. The Ogra – Câmpia Turzii lot 2 was awarded to the joint-venture between Astaldi and Max Bögl, for a cost of 379.7 million lei. The Ogra – Câmpia Turzii lot 3 was awarded to the joint venture Straco Grup - Specialist Consulting - Total Road, for a cost of 279.7 million lei.
The contract for the Târgu Mureș – Ungheni segment was terminated in April 2016, due to delays in pre-construction arrangements by the CNADNR, and was awarded again in November 2017, to the Austrian company Strabag. However, the bid was challenged in court and it was not signed until the end of May 2020. The contract is worth 39 million euro and is supposed to take 18 months to complete.
On 12 December 2018, the Târgu Mureș – Ogra lot 2 and the Ogra – Câmpia Turzii lot 1 opened to traffic for a continuous motorway segment of 13.7 km between Ungheni and Iernut.

Cluj-Napoca West – Nădăşelu – Borș section

The section is divided into three subsections: Cluj-Napoca West – Mihăiești, Mihăiești – Suplacu de Barcău and Suplacu de Barcău – Borș.
The remaining works on the Suplacu de Barcău – Borș subsection were awarded for construction in April 2015, but no progress had been recorded as of January 2016. In November 2016, the contract was reportedly close to being terminated.
In August 2018, the same subsection were auctioned for the third time, with some of the winners of the bids still pending to be awarded. The subsection is divided into three lots: lot 1, Suplacu de Barcău – Chiribiș ; lot 2, Chiribiș − Biharia, and lot 3, Biharia − Borș. In October 2018, the lot 2 was awarded to the Romanian company Trameco, part of the Selina Group, but this was challenged and, as of June 2020, the contract has been signed. yet. In December 2018, it was announced that the contract for the lot 3 was signed with a joint-venture led by the same company, Trameco. It is worth 28.5 million euro and has the deadline in 19 months. The same month, the lot 1 was awarded to the same company, but the bid was challenged and the result was still expected.
In March 2019, additional segments were tendered: Nădășelu – Mihăiești – Zimbor, Zimbor – Poarta Sălajului and Nușfalău – Suplacu de Barcău.
In June 2019, two more contracts were awarded: Suplacu de Barcău – Chiribiș and Chiribiș – Biharia. However, the tender for the Suplacu de Barcău – Chiribiș segment, awarded to the Constructii – Hidroelektra Mehanizacija joint venture, was canceled in October 2019, after the Croatian partner filed for insolvency, whereas the one for the Chiribiş – Biharia segment has been contested again and was still under trial procedures until June 2020, when it was signed with a joint-venture led by Trameco. The value of the contract 67.5 million euro, with 6 months allowed for the projection and 18 months for the construction.
Lotul Zimbor-Poarta Salajului a fost semnat pe 26 iunie pentru 680 mil. Lei cu constructorul Spedition UMB

Openings timeline

As of December 2019, the following progress was recorded: