The study on the Danube-Oder-Elbe water channel is now public

"According to the economic assessment, further planning of the water canal connecting rivers Danube and Odra makes sense. The Central Commission of the Ministry of Transport proposed to disregard the Elbe branch of the corridor due to very high construction costs of long navigation tunnels. I will recommend continuing with the preparation of the Danube-Odra part of the water canal project with expected costs of CZK 283 billion," says the transport minister Dan Ťok.
 

Different variants of the water canal, including the combination of only some branches, were assessed in the study. The results confirmed that the project variant that includes the Elbe branch is risky. The Central Commission of the Ministry of Transport therefore recommended planning the Danube-Odra branch, negotiate the border crossing with Poland and Slovakia and do SEA together with these two partner countries.
 

The government will decide about the next steps in the preparation of this water canal and can approve the recommendation of the Central Commission of the Ministry of Transport, i.e. dropping the Elbe branch and continuing with the Danube-Odra branch on the Czech territory.
 

The Ministry of Transport assigned the feasibility study for the Danube-Odra-Labe water corridor to check the economic effectiveness of this prospective new water route in terms of transportation, water management, energy and recreational function. The study was prepared in line with government decision of January 19, 2011 that inputs shall be prepared for a water canal assessment and for the decision whether the canal shall be kept it or removed from landscape protection. Work on the study started in July 2016 and the final wording of the document was approved by the Central Commission in December 2018.

 
You can download the study using the link below. Due to a limited number of downloads, we are adding two more links where the study can be downloaded. Please note that the study has about 5 GB.