2024-04-05 16:06:06
Temporal extension of the Concessions with a parallel extension of their object to include infrastructure maintenance projects of each Region that hosts a concession project was proposed by TEE President George Stasinos speaking at the conference “Infrastructure and Networks: The Greek Reality. Modernization, Resilience and Sustainable Development”. He emphasized the need to cultivate a culture of maintenance in the public sector as well as in the private sector – and in private individuals, “a culture to repair our house”, as he characteristically mentioned – while at the same time he referred to the need to extend the application of the Building Inspector’s model to sectors that are not effective the State.
The President of the TEE made special reference to the great project of the National Infrastructure Registry, where the platform will be ready by June and all the involved bodies will be invited to join the projects of their competence. On this platform, there will be the identity of each project with its technical details as well as information such as the authority that has undertaken its maintenance, the history of maintenance, etc. Thus, “everyone will know who is responsible” characteristically noted Giorgos Stasinos, describing that the State must ensure that the data of each infrastructure is entered by all agencies in a timely and adequate manner.
Then the President of the TEE presented a solution to the problem of finding the resources for the maintenance of the projects. According to Giorgos Stasinos, we must “build a model that is based on the Concessions that already exist” and the company that has the Concession should also undertake the maintenance of the infrastructures located within the same Region. “So let’s extend the concession contract in some areas and let the companies established there take over the maintenance of the projects. It is not possible to hide the problem under the carpet” he observed.
At the same time, Giorgos Stassinos emphasized, modernization projects on existing infrastructure should be done through the Recovery and Resilience Fund and other European resources, “such as the smart bridges we are making. We should also monitor the projects, not just build them.” “Therefore funding from the Concessions, private projects with Concessions so that someone is interested in building them and so that the Regional Governors and Mayors do not hide because they cannot maintain the projects. This is the solution, it must be put into public discussion, let’s not hide, let’s all get into the logic of maintenance” he said summarizing.
Giorgos Stasinos referred to the European strategy that does not allow investments in maintenance projects and predicted, based on the analysis of the climate crisis and Resilience needs, that the funds that will be needed for the maintenance of the projects in the coming years, both in our country and in the other member states, it will be exorbitant and for this reason there should be a change of agreements and regulations at a high political level in order to claim and allocate resources from the EU for the maintenance of infrastructure projects.
He also referred to the problems currently faced by staff planning for infrastructure projects in Resilience, stressing that extreme events change the statistics that the State and scientists use to calculate project sizes. However, according to the President of the TEE, we cannot constantly increase the projects to catch every extreme phenomenon, as we would reach pharaonic plans that could not be implemented. Instead we need “many small projects” for the Resilience of the regions.
Continuing, the President of the TEE referred to the mandatory pre-seismic inspection of State buildings, specifically all schools, universities, hospitals, fire stations and police stations. “For the last 30 to 40 years we have been talking about seismic control. We start in May and June to do a pre-earthquake check on sensitive and critical infrastructures” he noted and added “let’s do these two basic things, start somewhere, see where we need money for maintenance because at the moment we are talking without data”.
Finally, Giorgos Stasinos emphasized the need for cooperation with the private sector and for another reason, noting that “the State cannot support all the projects that are needed as conditions have changed”. To cover this gap, he proposed the implementation of the Construction Controller model by utilizing the Engineers and the potential that exists. “There is a need to find a way in everything, don’t follow the well-trodden path and keep driving into the wall” concluded Giorgos Stasinos.