Ljubljana - The joy over the resumption of passenger rail service between Kočevje and Ljubljana after fifty years died away quickly after passengers looked at the timetable. Despite the EUR 100 million renovation of the track, the timetable is tailored only to working migrants, newspaper Dnevnik says on Tuesday.

Passengers will only have six trains available to go to the capital and seven to return, and the schedule is clearly tailored to people working from 7-8am to 4-5pm, while no trains are available on the weekends.

Moreover, the renovated track is monorail and not electrified, meaning of the lowest possible rank.

It is also very inconvenient that in half of the cases, passengers will have to switch trains in Grosuplje. In one case, they will have to wait almost 50 minutes for the next train, which is completely unacceptable, according to Dnevnik.

The reason for this is the basic infrastructure in Grosuplje, where only two trains can meet, so a direct connection between Ljubljana and Kočevje is virtually impossible to set up.

Originally, the Grosuplje railway station was to be renovated simultaneously with the Kočevje track, but the previous government did not find money for this project. The current government fixed this, so the Infrastructure Agency published a tender for the project this autumn.

Considering the amount of money available for sustainable mobility in the next EU budget and the post-epidemic recovery fund, plans for the renovation of the track connecting Ljubljana with the Dolenjska region should be made immediately. There should be two tracks from Dolenjska at least to Grosuplje, so the travelling time between Kočevje and Ljubljana could be shorter and the timetable more passenger-friendly.

Similar measures would be needed on the Kamnik-Ljubljana route and other routes to make them the backbone of public transport in the Ljubljana region. Trains should ride every 15, 30, 45 minutes and be fast enough to compete with cars.

The potential of the railway passenger service in the Ljubljana region is enormous and currently it is used only minimally. "If the state does not use the EU funds for modernising this network in the next five years, we will regret this lost opportunity for a long time," says the commentary, headlined Mocking Passengers with a 45-minute Wait to Change the Train.