NEWS FLASH
Skopje Airport will be linked to the city centre by rail under a new cross border project. The transport ministers from Macedonia and Serbia inked a Memorandum of Understanding last week to upgrade the rail network linking Belgrade and Skopje with the construction of a high-speed rail link between the two capitals via Niš, with an additional extension linking Skopje to Skopje Airport. The objective is to facilitate a significant increase in speed by modernising the existing line, aiming for speeds of up to 200 kilometres per hour. The Memorandum between the two states outlines a collaborative effort to secure funding from the European Union for the joint venture project.
OMG ! Finally, what a good achievement ! I was hoping for it for years now. So so cool ! I'm surprisingly amazed
ReplyDeleteGreat job for SKP and Macedonia!!
ReplyDeletewondering ... Is it not possible the rails tracks to go: Nis-SKP-Skopje?
ReplyDeleteThat would be very attractive for everybody south of Leskovac
Sure it can be linked, and it will be.
Deletebut it says extension to the airport which is not the same
DeleteThe rail tracks are about 2 km from the terminal. So a link could be built fairly easily. But don't expect anything for at least 5 years.
DeleteNis-SKP-Skopje makes no sense, because if you look at the map, SKP is south-east of Skopje, whereas Nis is to the north of the city. So logically, the train line coming from the north would need to pass Skopje before arriving at the airport, not the other way around.
DeleteI don't think one extra stop at Skopje railway station would be such a big deal for all those south of Leskovac who want to fly from SKP once we have a high-speed trains.
You obviously have never been to Skopje.The Niš- Skopje highway and the rail tracks are passing exactly there to the east of Skopje, where SKP is. Skopje is surrounded by mountains and that flat valley is the only way to access the city from the north.
DeleteNis is getting a high speed rail to Belgrade so I doubt it will be appealing for many to go to SKP
DeleteNis is halfway between Skopje and Belgrade. Most will gravitate to Belgrade as it is the same country minus a border, but for some it would make sense to use SKP as well, e,g, if they find a cheaper fare.
DeleteAnd for the ones in the far south like Vranje or Leskovac, Skopje is closer than Belgrade.
Some Macedonians from the south also travel to SKG or some from the east travel to SOF.
In summary, you can doubt as much as you like but people make their decisions based on what makes most sense to them.
There’s no border with Open Balkan agreement.
DeleteNice one! Hopefully it will materialise in our lifetime.
ReplyDeleteDepends if you are in your teens or in your seventies :D
DeleteThose is seventies are not gonna see this, but i hope we will. Just hope, like we hope for eveything else here even though we know we will never get it.
DeleteJust like many people said that we would never ride between Belgrade and Novi Sad at 200 kph? Yet now we have 30 trains per day on that route.
DeleteSerbia currently is experiencing a railway renaissance. In 12 months we will comfortably ride from Belgrade to Subotica in less than 80 minutes. Soon after, the full reconstruction of the line to Nis will begin and travel time will drop from 6 hours to 1 hour 40 minutes when complete.
That train is one of the best things that happened to Serbia since year 2000.
DeleteA train "renaissance"... we almost have one whole high speed line. The rest of the railways are reaching early 20 century speeds.
DeleteIt is a renaissance considering what the final plan is. Local autochauvinism is so 1990s.
DeleteYes it is renaissance compared to the dark decades of nonexistent investment and crumbling infrastructure, plus the time of SFRJ wasn't much better. There's a lot more work to he done but thank God it is going in the right direction now.
DeletePassenger numbers are up 3x from 2019 numbers.
Just checked out the SKP website and it is shocking to learn that (we hear it will soon be the second busiest airport in ex-Yu) aiming for 3 million to have a bus service every 3 hours!
ReplyDeletehttps://www.wtransporter.com/#timetable
Estonia has smaller population and roughly the same traffic and has up to 4 buses every hour in peak times:
https://transport.tallinn.ee/#bus/2/b-a/13601-1/en
Lets see if it is really worth investing that amount of money if there is barely anyone taking the public transport if it passes every 3 hours. Again, SKP is no village and this is hard to believe.
Well when there is more people for the bus, they send two buses or mini bus or they organise additional bus, its not that strict. I have used the bus quite a few times and it was more then half empty, but on the way back to the city i have seen many people waiting for it this summer ( most were tourists ). If a group of 4 are going to the airport then it is the same if they go with taxi or take the bus, as the bus ticket is 200 denari and taxi is 800-1000den. I am talking for taxi to and from Skopje, not other cities across the country. Before these comments start i want to say that there is no chance on earth that someone inroduce bus lines from every city to the airport and make bus station at SKP. That is funny and wont happen, and no airport has buses like that.
DeleteSecond busiest airport in ex-yu?
DeleteOkay we know that he is incorrect, dont start arguing about that now please, we all know that BEG is first, then comes ZAG, PRN and SPU, and after is Skopje.
Deletenow they cant troll SKP passengerwise and now they have moved on to the buses ^^
DeleteGet over it locals prefer cars to public transport and its similar like that in every developing country
It's said: "we hear it will soon be the second busiest airport in ex-Yu", so not yet the 2nd but thriving towards it. I would say with really good chances of achieving it.
DeleteI wrote about this and people started talking about villages and provinces. I completely agree! I am glad that there are people that see the problem in this! And the taxis don't cost 800 denari :). They start from 2000 up to 3000.
DeleteThis would be very good. It is very necessary to have a link with the train. If you ask me, the buses should stop at the airport too! Just like Flixbus. They drive past the airport anyway. A 15-20 minute delay would eliminate the need for going with strangers from Facebook groups.
GOSHHHH!!! Do you know how to read??? 100000 times we wrote that the TAXI from SKOPJE to SKP is 1000 denari. What is wrong with you?
DeleteEven with this train nothing will change for those who come to SKP from other cities. There is enough buses every three hours with the last one DEPARTING FROM THE CITY CENTER at 18:00 which is perfect for the evening flights and buses from THE AIRPORT TO THE CENTER at 23:45 and 02:00 which is perfect for the evening flights. There is no other NO OTHER airport in the world which has buses directly to other cities. Maybe there is from Hahn to Frankfurt and so on but nothing else. Stop trolling the same thing over and over again. It is obvious that you need to drive to the airport or catch a bus to Skopje and from there on the shuttle to the airport in order to get there. If i fly from Sofia i organise my self, i dont ask the airport for introducing some stupidity just because i think its smart. Stop saying the same thing!
DeleteAlso, if you think that there should be more frequencies then go to the counter at the airport and tell them that, nobody is hearing you here or ask your city to do something.
DeleteNobody in the history of this website has asked and talked for miserable things like this. Everything else is fine, now we will talk for the bus? Its funny and its redicilous!
DeleteThis guy is unhinged
Delete21:34, the article is about the airport rail LINK. The bus example is given as it may also be linked to the rail one. In other words, if the airport today offers 5 buses per day then how do we expect it to initiate an entire airport railway station? Inking documents with other countries is very easy, but the actions are more important. The airport bus example is quite good. Should there be trains one day from the airport, then how many are to be expected? Because, yes it is good being connected to Nis, but it makes much more sense to use this train frequently to the city centre and not just to 1 destination. Either way, you cannot ignore the fact that the bus service is simply not enough for a capital of more than half a million and a traffic already expected to reach 3 million.
DeleteOvo nema nikakvog smisla pruga za Srbiju prolazi na kilometar od piste vec sada.
ReplyDeleteTo je stara pruga, gradi se high speed rail. A i kilometar od aerodroma je jako daleko , ako vučeš kofere...
DeleteOvo ce biti kompletno nova ruta nema veze sa starom.
DeleteThe rail that will be build from serbia to mkd will just giwe one crack that will connect the airport , this crack will be also finansied by the european bank in correspodence to the macedonian needs , they already signed the contract few days ago and both sides agree to this , so we will just see for how long this project will be build.
ReplyDeleteSo after this you will have choice from train , bus and taxi to the centre of skopje which is what actually needs to be for our country.
DeleteThe train link to the airport will be finalised when planes will stop flying globally
ReplyDeleteWow you are so smart , I bet you need 2 hours to write this comment!
DeleteThe airport in Skopje is disgustingly far from the city and i think it's the furthest one of all Ex-Yu countries and not only.
ReplyDeleteIn Europe i think only Athens is as far while Kuala Lumpur also comes to mind.
lol the stuff you have to read here.
DeleteLJU is the same distance from the city centre as SKP if not more distant by a 1-2 km.
MXP is 48km far away from the centre. Then you have ARN, OSL, MUC, CDG...
all more "disgustingly" far away from the city centre than SKP
The airport is where it is, disgusting or not. A rail link would be great. But the autobus should be at least every 30 minutes. Not one of Aэrologic's better comments.
DeleteIf there was so much demand for the bus then it would have been every 30 minutes. Of course they wont ignore the possibility to earn more money. Stop complaining about sometines all the time.
DeleteIt's definitely disgusting since in those cities:
Deletea) there is some high speed public transportation available which Skopje doesn't have and
b) all those cities are at least two or even ten times bigger than Skopje and their agglomeration didn't allow building the airport in any other place, while in Skopje there is nothing but fields all those 30km (unless someone tells me someone was planning in Yugoslavia for Skopje to have 10 million inhabitants)
c) as a result taking the transportation from SKP can either be longer in time (by bus) or more expensive (by taxi) than flying to places across Europe
It's clearly an airport i avoid for those reasons.
It's a clear mistake of urban planning, not least the 'every three hours bus'.
They should NOT earn money! Who is they? The bus should be from the public enterprise. I am paying ridiculous amounts to get to the airport, so that a few people can drive shiny cars. Not just me, me and a lot of people are paying for that! It SHOULD be every 30 minutes! Even if it goes in loss, it would be just like the post or the railway going into loss. What are the taxes for after all? Tav should seriously consider increasing the frequency of the bus. They can finance it from the liposuction surgery banners that hang in the check in hall. Just an idea
DeleteThis man writes bullshit. Even present position of airport is not good they fly directly to hill Ajvatovci.
Delete@Aэrologic
DeleteSkopje is surrounded by mountains and hills to the west, south and north. The only possible location is to the east. The question is how far east. Perhaps the airport could have been just south of Ilenden. But the urban planners of the time has the foresight to build the airport a few kilometres further east so as not to disrupt life in Ilenden, Kadino and other nearby villages.
Also, by building it in it's present location there is more room for future expansion and less disruptions to nearby villages of which there is really few.
The only real issue is the poor public transportation to/from the airport to the city centre. This can be corrected with a few more buses at peak hours.
The location of the airport was clearly a good decision by urban planners and officials at the time.
Aэrologic, you are way off on this one.
sorry aerologic that Skopje airport is not in your living room
DeleteHere you can find everything. I am sorry that they didnt consult you when they were builiding the airport in the 30s. Some guy from i dont know where comes here and talks bullshit about the airport of Skopje. Keep quiet and be hapoy that you have an airport nearby and dirrect flight to german villages.
Delete@19.13 " It's clearly an airport i avoid for those reasons."
Deletelol where are you from to "avoid" this airport? As if you would have an alternative if you are flying to Macedonia. What a nonsence comment
there is nothing but fields all those 30km
Deletefields?? there are mountains and no fields.
Neznanje je opasnije od polu znanje
For me as a customer it is 'disgusting' and i don't have to give the reasons why.
DeleteThe airport is where it is, disgusting or not. A rail link would be great. But the autobus should be at least every 30 minutes. Not one of Aэrologic's better comments.
ReplyDeleteCurrently no passengers rail connections between Serbia and N.Macedonia. (Re)start that first!
ReplyDeleteSerbia is doing a wonderful job with the railway. One to NS is completed, they are fixing it to Nis and they are even electrifying the one to Dimitrovgrad.
DeleteFirst fix the railway system. 10 days no train one locomotive once per day
ReplyDeleteCircus
https://meta.mk/lokomotivata-popravena-edinstveniot-voz-za-bitola-trgna-po-10-dena/
It's a good thing though. But if we take in consideration that there are so few trains, I don't think that it would be useful if there are only one or two trains per day. The train from Gevgelija isn't going because of some cracked bridge. The whole railway system is in collapse and the number of passengers keeps decreasing, understandably. A big change is necessary
DeleteEven if we compare the so called poorest country in Europe, Moldova. They have a very decent frequencies of their airport bus. Kishinev is 13km away from the centre:
ReplyDeletehttps://rtec.md/for-dubl-plugin-2/
Traffic is quite similar to SKP as well.
The idea of having a rail is amazing, but if you are uncapable of providing least 2 frequencies in rush hours or where there is more traffic, then the situation is not looking good. 6 buses per day for example is just too little and you are not stimulating people to use the public transport as it is in many European cities. Pretty sure there are also tourists that will be ripped off by the taxi drivers the Balkan way.
Also, wonder how much train traffic there will be between Skopje and Nis.
Будь что будет as Russians say.
It's impossible for tourists to get ripped off because at the taxi stand there is a big sign with the price(€25, 1500 denari) it's more expensive than the average Macedonian taxi but atleast you no what you pay. At SKP airport it's 50/50 to catch a bus and at some days 40/60. I think if you give that company €200 extra a day you will solve this issue but I think it isn't really seen as a public problem.
DeleteIt's very common pratice in Macedonia though that family or friends take you to the airport. So there is not really a loud voice that screams to improve the public transport.
As much as I love aviation, the more regional train links the better for everyone!
DeleteVery much true dat.
Delete