Dreams of modernising the capital and “Europeanising” it are more than a century and a half old, yet in the past decade they have turned into a nightmare, beginning with the groundbreaking ceremony for the first of the national-importance projects, Belgrade Waterfront, in September 2015.
The model of the elite development, displayed at the Belgrade Waterfront headquarters, gave no hint of what Savamala and the Sava amphitheatre would soon become.
The area first suffered during a criminal incursion of excavators on the night between 24 and 25 April 2016, when the rule of law effectively ceased to exist. Some consider that moment to be the adoption of the lex specialis (special law) for the aforementioned megaproject a year earlier, which drastically shortened procedures for planning, permits, and land expropriation, and created a legal framework for a partnership between Serbia and the United Arab Emirates via the Eagle Hills Company.
That alliance has brought us a forest of uniform skyscrapers along a stretch that continues to expand through new special laws, increasingly blocking the flow of air from the Sava towards the city centre. Now the devastation of the (admittedly neglected) Danube riverbank is next, soon to be choked with buildings all the way to the Pančevo Bridge, where Miroslav Mišković is constructing a new residential, business, and commercial complex on the site of failed factories such as BIM Slavija, facilities of the Serbian Furniture Industry, the Cotton Combine, and others.
Sava Square has been subordinated to the nationalist ideology of the republican authorities, first through the erection of an overpriced monument to Stefan Nemanja, and then through plans for a Museum Quarter in the final “reimagining” of the site. It will be dominated by the relocated Historical Museum of Serbia, housed in the former main railway station building. Pride in “national cultural identity and state-building tradition”, in the words of Culture Minister Nikola Selaković, will also be reinforced by the Archaeological Museum, to be located in the Post Office building in Savska Street. This building is currently undergoing restoration to its original 1929 appearance in a lavish Serbo-Byzantine style, which required almost demolishing its 1947 successor, built in the spirit of socialist realism down to its foundations.
“Serbia must not stop”
Rail traffic has been redirected to the Prokop station, effectively built on a landslide-prone site – something known for generations, which is why earlier authorities had abandoned the long-initiated project. Inheriting the “grey” concrete phase from previous efforts, the station leaks even in dry weather, and only received its operating permit last year, nine years after it opened in 2016.
The main bus station has also been relocated to an as-yet unfinished complex in Novi Beograd. The Old Sava Bridge has been demolished, and construction of the New Serbian Bridge has begun, as the mayor Aleksandar Šapić has already dubbed it. There has even been a blood toll – the death of a Chinese worker.
But “Serbia must not stop”, as President Aleksandar Vučić declared back in 2022, so why not embark on digging a tunnel between the Sava and Danube slopes? Previous authorities had considered this as well, but concluded that conditions were not yet right for such a major urban intervention.
“In order to relieve traffic in the central city zone, a tunnel some 200 metres from the current location was planned back in the time of former Yugoslavia. According to the 2008 master plan, this route was intended to be rail-based, but in the latest master plan from 2015, its purpose was changed to road traffic, allegedly backed by evidence of cost-effectiveness,” explains Nikola Jovanović, director of the Centre for Local Self-Government.
To a layperson, a mere 14% reduction in traffic congestion for an investment of around €220 million seems like a peculiar saving, and one might hope for clarification from the city’s chief urban planner Marko Stojčić. Alas, he did not deem it necessary to respond to pressing questions before this issue of Radar went to print.
Jovanović nevertheless believes the tunnel could be profitable – “provided there is no theft.” He also emphasises the importance of finally linking Novi Beograd with the eastern parts of the capital while bypassing the centre.
“There was another option: constructing a major semi-ring road around Belgrade, which the British firm WSP, author of the 2015 master plan, considered a higher priority and which was found to offer the best cost-benefit ratio,” notes traffic engineer Dušan Milanović, a retired planner from the Belgrade Urban Planning Institute. His work involved drafting planning documentation and analysing various tunnel options, for which preparatory works have recently begun rather ingloriously.
Namely, it emerged that PowerChina, once again assigned through an intergovernmental agreement, had set up a camp at Ada Huja without obtaining permits from the city Secretariat for Urbanism and the relevant municipal services. Even Mayor Šapić expressed surprise, yet concluded that “it wouldn’t be very smart to demolish the camp now only to rebuild it again.”
This suggests, in Milanović’s view, that “there are still conscientious individuals within city services who won’t issue permits lightly but adhere to professional standards and regulations, foremost among them the Planning and Construction Act.” In practice, this means authorities may resort to pressuring these independent experts to keep Serbia’s “progress” moving forward.
Residents along the route from the Faculty of Economics, through Lomina Street to Queen Natalija Street at the other end of the future tunnel, have also opposed the start of works. Fearing their homes could collapse once drilling begins – allegedly without prior geological surveys – they submitted objections to the Detailed Regulation Plan for the tunnel, which was adopted by the City Assembly on Monday, 27 April – six days after preparatory activities had already started.
Members of the citizens’ association, Residents of Terazije Terrace, also oppose the construction and commercialisation of green spaces included in the draft plan, arguing that this undermines the public and historical character of the slope. Milanović, however, notes that not all residents face equal risk; those living from Lomina Street towards Terazije need not fear the consequences of excavation.
Cause for concern
“The upper vault of the tunnel is planned at a depth of 20 to 41 metres, which is also its maximum depth. Those living between Gavrila Principa Street and Lomina Street may have reason for concern, as the soil layer there is only one to eight metres thick, meaning interventions in the terrain can be expected,” he explains. In other words – some structural collapses could occur.
However, “everyone is affected by the disgracefully low compensation offered through expropriation, as €2,500 per square metre is hardly enough to buy a decent flat on the outskirts, let alone in the area where they have lived for decades or generations.” Especially considering that nearby Belgrade Waterfront now commands prices between €4,000 and €10,000 per square metre…
Authorities have chosen to begin works at the tunnel’s end in Despot Stefan Boulevard, intending to reroute public transport lines. So far, the bus lane has been closed from the Dragoslav Srejović intersection to Jovan Avakumović Street to allow relocation of primary utility infrastructure. According to city manager Miroslav Čučković, much of this network of pipes and cables is not even recorded in existing documentation.
On that occasion, Čučković specified that excavation using the newly purchased tunnel-boring machine (alongside two for the metro) would take exactly 480 days, while other works cannot be predicted so precisely. He estimates the tunnel will be completed by 2030, with the first metro line from Makiš Field to Pančevo Bridge opening the following year.
Jovanović is sceptical, believing the tunnel cannot be completed before 2031.
“The authorities wanted excavation to begin before parliamentary elections, and for a metro line, bridge, and one tunnel tube to be finished before the Belgrade elections. Only the bridge will likely be completed, but without the tunnel it won’t serve its full purpose,” he warns.
Traffic collapse
The tunnel only makes full sense if used by public transport, and the city manager promises that 30 public transport lines will pass through it. Since no stretch or stop in the city accommodates that many lines, Milanović suspects far fewer will actually use the tunnel. “This route is primarily intended for individual car traffic, linking the Sava and Danube slopes, as well as connecting the Srem area with Banat and the eastern parts of the city,” he insists.
Consideration has also been given to fully suspending traffic in this part of the boulevard due to activation of the tunnel-boring launch site, with two alternative routes planned. Had planning been done earlier, the traffic collapse already evident – even on Sunday evenings – might have been avoided, exacerbated by “urgent works on expansion joints” on the Pančevo Bridge.
But by Expo – the “finish line and the light at the end of the tunnel”, as Čučković puts it – everything will be cosmetically polished. Until then, it is anyone’s guess who will come out unscathed in Belgrade’s accelerated urbanisation, marked by constant revisions or lack of foresight, always accompanied by market manipulations. The tunnel project was initially estimated at €100-130 million in 2017, based on optimistic mayoral projections, without a defined route, infrastructure solutions, or geological research.
After the draft plan in 2019, costs were slightly (and tactically) reduced, only to jump to €235 million after a memorandum with Chinese partners in 2023, assigning the works to PowerChina. The current official figure is slightly lower at €213 million, with most funding borrowed from the Postal Savings Bank.
“This means all Serbian citizens will be paying for the Belgrade tunnel,” Milanović points out.
The national budget also funds the metro and three “major attractions of the capital”: the newly opened observation deck on Kula Beograd, the pedestrianised former railway bridge over the Sava, and a panoramic wheel on the Novi Beograd side of Branko’s Bridge, where the New Serbian Bridge is now under construction.
Such measures are necessary because the city’s coffers are depleted, while the national budget is also under strain – something IMF reports will confirm, according to Jovanović. Some small change will remain to surprise citizens with whatever Šapić has in store next – perhaps even a monument to Chetnik leader Draža Mihailović in the middle of Terazije.
All of this unfolds amid a maze of roundabouts, metal railings, and decorative yet impractical traffic islands, creating merely the illusion of modernity.
(Radar, 04.05.2026)
https://radar.nova.rs/drustvo/manicna-modernizacija-beograda/