At the 16th Congress on Transport and Transport Infrastructure in Portorož in late October 2024, Slovenko Henigman presented a paper on the impact of transport infrastructure on the economy. Over the past 15 years, Slovenia has focused on sustainable mobility as a solution to traffic challenges, emphasizing the development of railways, bicycle paths, and public transport, while roads have largely been limited to basic maintenance.
The outcomes of these efforts have resulted in daily traffic jams on highways, with negative environmental impacts, a lower level of transport services, and only minimal growth in public transport usage. According to the World Economic Forum (WEF), Slovenia has dropped from 37th to 52nd place in terms of transport infrastructure development over the past fifteen years.
The PNZ transport model, developed for Slovenia, predicts that roads will continue to be the primary mode of transport. Despite necessary efforts towards sustainable mobility, which must be pursued more effectively, it is projected that at least 75% (currently 90%) of passenger kilometers will still be traveled by road.
It is therefore high time to give road infrastructure the role it deserves based on all indicators. This specifically means the urgent acceleration of construction of new and expansion of existing highway sections between Vrhnika and Domžale, as well as the construction of bypasses and modernization of existing state roads.
