Romanian motorways are coming bois, the question is, will you ride them?

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Ombiiii@reddit

I like the fact that not every poor EU members steal the EU funds. Respect from Hungary

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ILikeOldFilms@reddit

We use EU fonds for highways, hospitals and schools, so we can spend local funds on useless things such as big stadiums in ghost towns. 50% win.

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Xysma01@reddit

Can already see the bumps in the road

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v-s-g@reddit

So you’re building highways so that people from the Northern parts have easier and faster way to get to Bulgaria and from there to Greece in the summer? Nice!

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I like your entrepreneurial mindset. But it goes both ways, once we actually complete A3 (the one that goes from Bucharest to Hungary), I bet there'll be more than a few happy northeastern Bulgarians.

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v-s-g@reddit

I was joking. Happy to see that you actually manage to build infrastructure projects, unlike our fucking governments for DECADES.

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bagpulistu@reddit

To be fair, Bulgaria already has some really impressive highways on viaducts often shrouded by clouds in the mountains near Sofia.

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dwartbg9@reddit

We still have more highways per % of territory than Romania.

And we literally built 4 full highways in like 12 years.

And literally we just opened a brand new highway last year. (Highway Europe that goes from Sofia to the Serbian border).

Don't listen to the pessimistic Bulgarians here. Many are also kids that don't realize we didn't even have highways until 2010!!!!

This is a bit outdated map even. But all the fully completed highways that you see here were finished since we got in the EU! The one towards Greece and the other one towards Turkey didn't even exist until then!

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Aggravating-Bake-131@reddit

So Romania border is not important? The road from Ruse to Sofia is a disgrace. No offence, but It's more like a village road. Other than that it's ok.

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nomad-38@reddit

Yeah that's nice and all, but "fully completed" is kind of a moot point when the quality is laughable. I drive on pretty much all the highways south of the Balkan mountain quite regularly and the state of them is pathetic, especially the Plovdiv-Sofia part of Trakia makes me cry every time. Especially since it seems to be undergoing repairs constantly in different parts and still after every roadwork it gets worse, or best case lasts almost a year before shattering to pieces.

The knowledge of how build sturdy roads that last has been lost in time never to be uncovered again since the days of the Roman Empire i suppose.

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dwartbg9@reddit

The roads get fucked for one "sad" reason too which many people don't realize.

We are a fucking crossroad between Europe and Asia, the A1 highway is one of the most important roads in the continent. This is where all the freaking trucks from Asia and Turkey pass so they can go towards W.Europe. Sadly, the trucks are the main reason that fucks up the roads.
That's why throughout the years they have been thinking how to detour them, and that's why they made the toll system only for them and it's pretty expensive for them. So at least we can take some taxes that can go for repairs.

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drdr14@reddit

Trucks also pay high toll taxes, so these money should be reinvested in road infrastructure, that’s how it is everywhere else International trucks driving through Bulgaria, don’t fuck up our roads, they have weight regulations Local trucks that drive inert materials , grain, sand etc fuck up them as they are very often overloaded

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betacarotentoo@reddit

Yes, I crossed them last year, very nice views.

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

I think you're being a bit harsh on yourself. Yes, Hemus is its own category, no arguing there, but our countries signed memorandums to improve cooperation on infrastructure projects last year if I remember right.

I've seen some feasibility studies taking place to build a motorway towards Ruse and a new bridge, I think if the Bulgarian authorities see commitment from Romania to start building, you'll start building as well. Have a little faith.

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Impossible_Nail_3967@reddit

😅 For that too

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dpenchev@reddit

I've driven over a romanian highway and it was ... well a highway. Like any other. Freshly built, you may as well be on the autobahn. But building them is the easiest part. Hopefully you'll be able to maintain them for years to come. Not like us and our patchwork of failures that we call the A1

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YaBoi_Shnoofles@reddit

I've driven around a lot of the places where theyve started digging out terrain for these and I can already tell these roads won't last a year , half of them were muddy clay pits that had been flooded by ground waters , no matter what they put over it the asphalt that lays on top is going to become so bad that a 130 KMh speed limit will be unreachable anyway.

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Outside_Resist_8319@reddit

Would tractors or horse carts without any lights be allowed to ride there at night? If they will be allowed there there will too many accidents for sure. Writing this as a person who had accident three times, riding from Bucharest to Giurgiu in a night. Good that after the first one dropped speed to 60-65.

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Archaeopteryx111@reddit

😂 when did you visit Romania?

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Outside_Resist_8319@reddit

Last time drove throgh seven years ago.

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Archaeopteryx111@reddit

Come again!

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Outside_Resist_8319@reddit

I know there are many improvements in Romania as a person frequently visiting Bucharest and Constanta for business purposes. I can clearly say most them even better than many EU countries. Although I did not ride a car in Romania between cities again, I know very well that roads and road lighting improved, hope you could able to teach your villagers to put at least cat lights to their tractors. And never understood why they drove lights off at night where there were no lights at the road as well.

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Archaeopteryx111@reddit

Out of curiosity, what kind of business do you do that brings to Romania so frequently? As for the villagers, they’re not good at listening…

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Outside_Resist_8319@reddit

Home chemicals and and personal care products.

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

This is an up to date map.

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HorrorsPersistSoDoI@reddit

I don't see a good route from Bulgaria to Hungary :(

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Critical-Bunch2734@reddit

What s wrong with you my brother..

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Impossible_Nail_3967@reddit

We are in building phase, probably 10-15 more years

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HorrorsPersistSoDoI@reddit

Ah good, I'll wait

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

Talking about entitlement. There's 50-100 km from A2/A0 from the northeastern Bulgarian border which you can travel via national roads (which are in decent condition), or do you expect Romania to build motorways up to your house as well?

Are your motorways connecting to Romania complete, or even in planning phase? No? Then this kind of comments are nothing less than snarky and condescending.

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_Winter-Wolf_@reddit

On 19.01.2026 they began to develop the feasibility study for Bucharest-Giurgiu-Ruse, the end date should be sometime in May 2027, and it will probably be completly build in 2029-2030

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Maarten-Sikke@reddit

Bridge may be a bit costly, but that shouldn’t take anyway long to be built altogether.

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Stoyfan@reddit

Unfortunately the road planners have forgotten Bulgaria exists

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IcePuzzleheaded7333@reddit

Depends from where in Bulgaria. If you enter through Ruse, the national road up untill A0 which circles Bucharest is very good and from A0 you can enter A1 in which you can drive all the way to Hungary with small exceptions (85% of the motorway is built already).

If you enter Romania from Silistra or Durankulak, there is A2 nearby which goes to Bucharest, then A0 the A1 again.

Ifnyou enter from Vidin well... you are probably better driving to Hungary through Serbia.

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Neutrinomind@reddit

Nor there will be for a good amount of time

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howtobatman101@reddit

Yeah just don't take the national roads. Go via Srbija.

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

There are national roads you can take in the disjointed segments, since those are mountains and it needs around 70 tunnels to go through them and a fuckton more viaducts, so those take a while to finish.

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vodka-bears@reddit

Wait, no connection to Bulgaria? Means Serbia remains the main transport route Europe to Turkey.

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Archaeopteryx111@reddit

The route from Ruse/Giurgiu to Bucharest is 2 lanes each way, so almost as good as a highway. They’re planning a new highway there too.

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Stavvy_@reddit

I drove to Oradea airport from Hungary on Monday (yes, it is better to fly from Romania, especially if half of Budapest is closed becaused of Vance), and that one is perfectly fine. Keep on building!

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Archaeopteryx111@reddit

How is the Oradea airport?

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Stavvy_@reddit

They renewed the terminal building in 2024. It is clean, effective - works nice. They have some HiSky and Wizzair flights, but for me the more important ones are the one to Warsaw (LOT) and the one to Munich (LOT). It takes around 10 minutes from the parking lot to the gate including checking in luggage and going through security :)

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Archaeopteryx111@reddit

Nice! 10 minutes is great! In the meantime, with EU funds, they built a new airport in Brasov and modernized the airports in Craiova and Constanta as well. :)

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Stavvy_@reddit

Yeah, Romania is ahead of Hungary in this. We have only one airport apart from Budapest, and that is tiny and obsolete... although the country is smaller, you can reach Budapest from anywhere with max 3 hrs of driving

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

Planes are a "desperate" solution/strategy for us because of our complicated topography. Easier to fly over 1000km of a fat ass mountain range.

Regarding trains though, Hungary is way ahead (and even in km of motorways you still have about 500km more, built much earlier). First time I was on a Hungarian motorway it was around 2001, we didn't even have home internet back then, you had to know a guy who knows a guy with a 56k modem, even having a computer was "neighborhood worthy" news.

The more I think about it the more I realize just how backwards we were. Holy shit dictatorships are bad for one's health.

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Stavvy_@reddit

Hungarian trains are notoriously bad quality, they are slow, they break down, etc - all the money that was supposed to be spent on maintenance and modernisation got stolen. It now takes longer to travel from the city where I grew up at (Debrecen) to Budapest than in my childhood, 25 yrs ago. As for highways: the goverments before Orban gave it a big kick but also in the past 16 yrs, many km-s were built. These are big investments, which benefit Orbans family (his father owns open pit mines for the raw material) and also the work itself is carried out by the oligarchs. This is so many highways are being built for 2-3x the prices of the Croatian ones - that go through mountains and complicated terrain. I believe one of the Hungarian highways was even more expensive per km as a new one in Switzerland...

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

I can very much relate to everything you've written, saddening nevertheless. I hope Magyar wins, not necessarily because I know much about him, but because Orban has to go. I'd rather have a prosperous Hungary as a neighbor than a pariah state, and everyone deserves a better, happier life.

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Stavvy_@reddit

Amen to that. As written above, there is a good chance that our temu-Putin loses. Both my kids were born abroad, it would be nice to tell them at one point that it is a good idea to move to Hungary...

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

Dude, you have no idea how much I hope you get rid of Doucheban. I'm seeing Hungary elections all over the place (even on LastWeekTonight). Regarding the motorways, bit of a shame it took so long but hey, better late than never.

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Stavvy_@reddit

I dont live in Hungary anymore but i will still vote, even though I have to take a flight to get to the embassy within the country where I live...

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SolutionTime5811@reddit

Traffic so and so.

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Successful-Map-9331@reddit

All I can say is: WELCOME TO THE FUTURE, ROMANIA!

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TheCharalampos@reddit

One does not ride a road, they drive through it.

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Admirable_Gas1653@reddit

And where in Romania are these pictures from?

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Archaeopteryx111@reddit

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Admirable_Gas1653@reddit

Thanks!

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

I won't mentioned the number within the images cause I'm too lazy to sift through them, but the construction sites are as follow:

- Expressway DEx6 Braila - Galati

- Autostrada A0 (Bucharest Orbital)

- Autostrada A1 - Sibiu-Pitesti - Lot 2 - Boita - Cornetu

- Autostrada A3 Chiribiș-Suplacu de Barcău

- Autostrada A3 Nădășelu-Zimbor-Poarta Sălajului

- Autostrada A7 Adjud - Bacău

- Autostrada A7 Adjud - Răcăciuni

So 5 different motorways total from around the country.

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Admirable_Gas1653@reddit

Thanks! This is what I wanted

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Revolutionary-Ice-56@reddit

Motorway building sites.

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Attack_na_battak@reddit

Great job neighbors, now transit through Serbia will be reduced and maybe, price of tickets will go down.

Doubt but hope...

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

Mathematically at least a bit of the traffic should flow through Romania after the network is completed. Where's that traffic coming from generally?

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Cristopia@reddit

I'd say Bulgaria Greece Turkiye, and then MN, KS, AL and maybe southern RO

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tigruland@reddit

For a moment I was confused why you were talking about Montana, Kansas, and Alabama, then I could not figure out what state RO was…..

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Cristopia@reddit

Lol they have too long names for their populations so I just shortened

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tigruland@reddit

Look here buddy I know how to steal not read!

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Barbak86@reddit

Albania uses Italy mostly. Kosovo goes through Serbia-Croatia or Serbia-Hungary, depending on where you are heading. Turkey and Bulgaria will probably switch to using Romania

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Ascension_84@reddit

Turkish population from DE and NL probably?

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ace_098@reddit

It could get reduced when we introduce those automatic plate reader/enc tolls that will change tarrifs depending on traffic density and day of the week, so both your and our A3 could see much less transit.

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AdWonderful3621@reddit

Not gonna happen for years. They didn't even started their part of the via Carpathia.

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CatL1f3@reddit

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hruschov@reddit

What are they connecting? And for real, you didn’t have highways before?

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Archaeopteryx111@reddit

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The_Inventor_Stick@reddit

You guys didn’t have highways before?

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timisorean_02@reddit

We do, we've had more km than Serbia for the past 3-4 years.

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The_Inventor_Stick@reddit

I just got got confused cuz the wording made me think these are the first highways being built, I’m sorry

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IcePuzzleheaded7333@reddit

Before joining EU, we had a total of 100km of highways connecting the cities of Bucharest and Pitesti. After joining EU back in 2007, we started to massively build highways and now we sit at around 1400 km of highways already built + another 1200KM which are in different stages of building and, if nothing bad happens, should be done in the next 5-6 years.

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betacarotentoo@reddit

Nope, the Bucuresti-Drajna A2 section was finished in 2004.

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EfficientlyOff@reddit

gif

Its very hard to be better then Serbia in a last two decades...You do have a bigger country neighbour

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timisorean_02@reddit

You had more km than us until like 2019, that was what I was trying to say.

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MinimumArt8781@reddit

Nope. We only started building Highways after 2007, there were some attempts before that but failed due to The „3rd world finances that we had back then" . The communists believed they were useless. They fkd up the cities too, making narrow streets and large concrete blocks on each side so we cannot expand them either. Since 2007 some highways have been built but Geography doesn't really help us either, the Carpathians aren't ”ideal„ for making highways.

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betacarotentoo@reddit

Nope, we have started building them in Nastase's time as PM. It's A2 I'm talking about. The Bucuresti-Drajna section was finished in 2004.

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SoulEkko@reddit (OP)

No, we were riding sheep into LaLaLand.

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