By Fotis Foteinosy

The bill for the separation of ERGOSE from OSE is presented to today’s Council of Ministers. ERGOSE will cease to be a subsidiary company of OSE and will be transferred directly to the Greek government.

With the new separation of the responsibilities of OSE and ERGOSE, the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport hopes to proceed, in a more efficient way, in the reorganization of the mechanism of production and supervision of railway projects.

In particular, the OSE (infrastructure manager) will undertake the management of the railway infrastructure and all the work required for the railway network in operation, i.e. both regular and heavy maintenance, as well as decommissioning work.

The OSE, through the planning of the maintenance work of the railway line in operation, will aim to reduce errors, in order to stabilize the efficient traffic of the line and limit the possibility of its quality degradation.

The responsibilities of ERGOSE

Accordingly, ERGOSE (project manager) will focus on undertaking new rail infrastructure projects outside the operational network, e.g. new lines, existing network extensions and upgrades.

The basic function of ERGOSE is the management of all activities related to the implementation of new projects, i.e. studies, expropriation procedures, tendering, material supply, construction, health and safety, quality control and delivery of a completed project to OSE for exploitation.

For its part, the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport will be responsible for planning the strategic direction of a long-term action plan, taking care of the effective allocation of the required resources for the implementation of the actions – programs and the achievement of the strategic goals, taking at the same time taking into account the proposals of the two companies.

The ministry will be responsible for establishing a corporate governance framework, clarifying the strategic planning framework, while controlling the efficiency and achievement of the two companies’ goals.

Implementation of the plan will be monitored through performance contracts between the ministry and each of the two companies, according to their new responsibilities. Each contract will include annual achievement targets and milestones for the companies.