At its January session, the Municipal Council of Stara Zagora voted to support the municipality’s representative in “Industrial Zone Zagore” AD in the upcoming shareholders’ general assembly regarding the signing of a loan agreement with the Bulgarian Development Bank (BDB). The funds will be used for the development and enhancement of the future “Industrial Zone Zagore-Elendino,” which includes the site of Stara Zagora Airport—the first civilian airport in the country, which began operations in 1937. The proposal, submitted by Mayor Zhivko Todorov, was included as an urgent item on the session’s agenda.
Debates on the topic lasted for over an hour, with municipal councilors from “Vazrazhdane” being the only opponents to the mayor of Stara Zagora.
The dispute over whether or not to have an airport in Stara Zagora has been ongoing for years, with advocates on both sides presenting their positions.
The mayor of the municipality has been an advocate for the position that the airport has no future and should be transformed into an industrial zone. In front of the municipal councilors, Zhivko Todorov described the claim that an airport could be an urban planning element as nonsensical, stating that an airport is only built when a city has a need for it. He reminded them that Stara Zagora Airport had operated flights that were discontinued long before its license was revoked due to unprofitability and lack of interest. “Now there is just a large area that cannot be called an airport,” asserts Zhivko Todorov.
Furthermore, the regulations governing its construction and operation have changed so much that, according to the new technical requirements, the airport would literally need to be built from scratch in order to be licensed. For this purpose, an investment of hundreds of millions of BGN will be required.
Plans to transform the airport into an economic zone date back nearly ten years. The airport is owned by the State Consolidation Company and was pledged as collateral for a loan to the Bulgarian Development Bank (BDB). After the loan was repaid at the beginning of last year, the airport was released from seizure. This opens the possibility for the municipality of Stara Zagora to request the Ministry of Economy and Industry to transfer the airport and the land on which it is built to them without cost.
However, in that case, the municipality would not be able to conduct dispositional transactions or sell lands, which are the intentions of the local authorities.
Mayor Todorov, who is a member of the Executive Commission of the GERB party, has likely received assurance that the land—around 2,000 decares—will be sold to “Industrial Zone Zagore” for 54 million BGN including VAT, which translates to a price of 26 BGN per square meter, significantly lower than the current market price. “This will provide an additional opportunity for the zone to make good deals and have greater revenues,” justified the mayor during the Municipal Council session.
In practice, this is an offer from the GERB government to a GERB mayor.
Among the arguments against retaining the airport, besides the impracticality of investing funds for its repair and maintenance without guarantees of return, the mayor also pointed out that there are functioning airports 200 kilometers to the east in Burgas and 100 kilometers to the west in Plovdiv. “Currently, this land cannot meet all the technical requirements and urban planning standards,” the mayor commented. He recalled that several years ago, a petition was submitted by residents of the “Kolyu Ganchev” neighborhood against the idea of restoring the airport. It is located just a few hundred meters from residential and industrial buildings, which, according to Todorov, is illegal.
It is interesting how the Sofia Municipality ensures the safety of people in Sofia neighborhoods over which hundreds of heavy aircraft fly around the clock.
The mayor referred to the project for the new economic zone as an investment in the future, which will most likely yield returns only after 7-8 years. The municipality is a majority shareholder in “Industrial Zone Zagore” with a 58% stake, which means it will also have to take on a corresponding part of the loan that the BDB is expected to grant for the construction of the new “Industrial Zone Zagore-Elendino.”
The mayor, most likely intentionally, did not mention and none of the councilors asked where the money for the construction of infrastructure in the individual industrial lands will come from, or whether the municipality would become burdened with new debts amounting to tens of millions.
The Stara Zagora organization of “Vazrazhdane” issued a declaration asking for the proposal to be withdrawn until citizens are transparently informed about the benefits and negatives of closing the airport, which can only happen after a thorough analysis of the existing data.
During a meeting between “Vazrazhdane” MP Daniel Prodanov and Minister Grozdan Karadzhov, the minister and his team maintained the position that it would be beneficial to preserve the Stara Zagora airport as part of the network of small airports in the country. This viewpoint was also expressed in a written response from the Ministry of Transport and Communications to MPs Iskra Mihailova and Daniel Prodanov: “In the context of the expected development of vertical takeoff and landing flights and unmanned aerial systems for the transport of passengers, goods, and postal shipments, this is particularly relevant.”
The Ministry of Transport and Communications’ principled stance is to preserve, restore, and develop existing airports as part of the overall transportation infrastructure.
Not everyone shares the same view in the Ministry of Economy and Industry. The new minister has yet to respond to the questions posed by Kostadin Kostadinov’s MPs regarding the status of the airport in Stara Zagora. In a previous response from the interim minister Petko Nikolov, it was indicated that the airport has many advantages both as a potential location for a major investment project and for the development of an industrial zone, due to its large area and existing infrastructure elements—such as electricity, gas, water, and sewage—that allow for a quick start to an investment project.
The response indicates that the possibilities for restoring, preserving, and developing the former civil airport have been considered multiple times, but the expert assessment concludes that such actions would be inefficient, impractical, and economically unfeasible, and would not lead to the expected outcomes for the development of Stara Zagora.
Previous ministers of economy have expressed similar positions to the leadership of the Stara Zagora municipality, said Mayor Zhivko Todorov during the discussion on the topic. In his response to Daniel Prodanov, the mayor emphasized that numerous negotiations with large companies and potential investors have ended in failure precisely due to the lack of a designated large area with established infrastructure for production development, which has resulted in significant missed opportunities. A report by Industry Watch from a few years ago identified this same issue as a major challenge for the city. Mayor Todorov expects the development of a new industrial zone to provide alternative employment for those affected by the transition to a neutral economy in Bulgaria over the coming years, which will impact at least 80% of jobs in the energy and mining sectors in the region. However, the new cabinet guarantees that operations at the “Maritsa East” complex will not be shut down before 2038.
Until then, who knows whst happens …
Someone has evidently misled the Minister of Economy into believing that the new industrial zone will have ready infrastructure. Architect Veselin Berov—one of the advocates for preserving the airport—asserts that if it is converted into an industrial zone, a gas and electrical network, a new pumping station, and a sewage system that returns water 1.5 kilometers to the collector will need to be constructed. This will cost the municipality tens of millions of BGN, which it does not have and will need to seek through European funds and programs.
The architect has developed a Pro bono project for development that combines an airport on a 1,000-decare land area with a runway, an administration zone, and a place for parking aircraft alongside an industrial zone that allows for the development of small and medium-sized enterprises, as well as an adjacent residential area. The project is set to be presented publicly.
The decision voted on by the Municipal Council of Stara Zagora to convert the former civil airport (where military aircraft were stationed nearly a century ago) into an industrial zone is not yet final, or at least this is what opponents of the idea want to believe. Beyond the public discussions, municipal councilors and others, not just from “Vazrazhdane,” have commented that
the future sales of industrial land in the new zone will benefit companies and individuals close to GERB. Those who are selling will also profit from the deals.
The difference between a politician and a statesman lies in the fact that politicians think within the scope of their term, while a statesman considers at least 50 years ahead. Whether the mayor of Stara Zagora and his team are visionaries is something the public can judge based on their actions and decisions. They can ask themselves, ten years from now, in the context of the technological revolution and particularly the increasing automation of various industries, what a city will need more—an industrial zone or an airport that can accommodate all types of small, modern powered, glider, and unmanned aerial vehicles, as well as agricultural planes where pilots can be trained, skydiving can be developed, and more.
The ancient Latin phrase Si vis pacem, para bellum, translates to “If you want peace, prepare for war!” Its relevance is evidently not even suspected by today’s leaders in Stara Zagora. Otherwise, they would consider an unfavorable (God forbid) scenario regarding the escalation of the war in Ukraine. Because the peace promised by former President Donald Trump is by no means guaranteed. In that case, will the airport infrastructure be neglected in such an unacceptable manner? And what would military experts say about this topic, for instance?
