Industrial park construction begins in Liepāja's former 'Metalurgs' area

The first major street construction works in the territory of the former metalworking plant Liepājas Metalurgs will start soon. The Liepaja Special Economic Zone (SEZ) Authority has managed to attract EUR 10 million to start the first phase of infrastructure construction, Latvian Radio reports August 20.

The territory of the former "Metalurgs" is not a dead zone  - a small part has already been leased to several companies for both warehousing and production purposes. Viesturs Romanovs, Deputy Head of the Liepaja SEZ Infrastructure Department, showed Latvian Radio a warehouse for grain, next to which a new street is going to be built soon.

On August 26, the site is scheduled to be handed over to the builder, and soon the Brīvibas Street pass of the former Liepājas Metalurgs factory will also be dismantled, where queues of factory workers used to flood.

"Brīvības Street will be closed, no one will be able to enter here anymore. We plan to organize all access to the Metalurgs territory through Meldru Street, where there was another historical pass, where they used to bring blanks, all oversized loads. We will also use the old entrance during the construction," said Liepaja SEZ Manager Uldis Hmieļevskis (Liepaja Party).

The project is being implemented with funding from the Recovery and Resilience Facility. The program was set up for the development of industrial parks in Latvian regions with a total funding of €80 million.

"We took part in this tender and have attracted the first 10 million. Of course, this will not be enough. We need more to develop the whole area, but with this first funding we built three layers of streets. We are also building an electricity supply network, which will make a fairly large area accessible and affordable so that we can attract the first investors," said Hmieļevskis.

The Liepaja SEZ Manager said that the implementation of this project will be the beginning and the work started in the future should be continued to achieve the goals of creating another industrial park in Liepaja, which will replace the territory of the former "Metalurgs" with a greener and more environmentally friendly business. There is a lot of interest from companies in the energy sector.

"Taking into account these transformations that are taking place all over Europe and globally, we can get on this train, maybe be the pioneers. (...) The territory of "Metalurgs" will be the one where we will see a completely different type of manufacturing companies than we are used to," said Hmielevskis.

The currently planned construction of streets and all necessary utilities is to be completed by December 31, 2025.

In total, several kilometers of streets are to be built, including water supply, municipal and stormwater sewerage, as well as heating networks. At the same time as the street works, the construction of the electricity supply networks will be launched by AS "Sadales tīkls".

In 2023, the Liepaja SEZ Authority signed a lease agreement with Liepaja Steel Ltd, which provides for the dismantling and removal of the electric steel melting furnace by the end of next year, marking the end of the metallurgical era in Liepaja.

Source: Eng.LSM.lv (Latvian Public Broadcasting), Inga Ozola (Latvian Radio)
Photo: Inga Ozola (Latvian Radio)