FCC, through its Austrian subsidiary Alpine, has been awarded two contracts to modernize railway lines in Bosnia. The contracts are worth a total of 85 million euro. Contract performance will be done through a consortium with another company.

The contracts concern the 99-kilometre-long railway line between Sarajevo and Ploce and a 65-kilometre-long section running between Kostajnica and Josavka. The work, which consists in replacing the lines' rail and ballast to raise the maximum train running speed and thus improve transport and connections along these corridors, has a two-year completion period.

The work on the Sarajevo/Ploce line is worth 51.1 million euro. Forty-five percent of this budget will be funded by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), and 55% will be funded by the European Investment Bank (EIB). A great deal of technical complexity is involved in modernizing this route because of the large number of tunnels and bridges along its length.

The contract for the Kostajnica/Josavka line calls for the renovation of the 65-kilometre-long Banja Luka/Doboj section for 33.9 million euro. In this case, 45% of the money will be coming from the EBRD and the remaining 55%, from the EIB.