Bridge number 7 is 194 metres long. It is the longest bridge on the Beljakovce - Kriva Palanka section and one of three that have to be built entirely from scratch. The other 26 bridges along the route sit on structures from works begun back in the nineties.

Thirty-four kilometres of railway require 15 tunnels and 29 bridges. That is the measure of the terrain - mountainous, difficult, the kind where every kilometre costs as much as several on flat ground. According to Siniša Ivanovski, director of "MŽ Infrastructure", the works are now moving at pace.

Three hundred and fifty-two elements, ten a week

Alongside the work on site, concrete elements are being produced to rehabilitate the 26 half-finished bridges. In total, 352 elements have to be made. So far 71 are done, at a rate of about 10 elements a week.

The arithmetic is not complicated: 281 remaining elements at 10 a week is around 28 weeks of production, for the concrete elements alone. That is part of why overall completion now stands at around 40 per cent, with a target of 50 by the end of the year.

Thirty-six years since it began

This is the figure that explains the whole story. The railway project toward Bulgaria began in 1990. Various companies worked on the route and stopped on it over the following decades. The contract for the Beljakovce - Kriva Palanka section was signed on 20 July 2022, and work officially began on 19 October the same year.

So: skeletons of bridges built in the nineties, now being rehabilitated with concrete produced in 2026, for a railway designed thirty-six years ago. When somebody says Corridor 8 is going slowly, it is worth knowing when that "slowly" started being measured.

What 40 per cent means

"We are continuing at an accelerated pace toward full completion of this major infrastructure project," Ivanovski said. The target by the end of the year is 50 per cent.

Forty per cent of 34 kilometres does not mean 13 finished kilometres with rails on them. It means progress on bridges, tunnels and the track bed - the most expensive and slowest parts. The rest moves faster once those are done. The question nobody says out loud is when the first train will run, because a date is still not being mentioned.