Preliminary assessment of the third payment request of Romania (2024)

in Q1 2026. Evidence provided: The following evidence was provided: i. Summary document duly justifying how the milestone (including all the constitutive elements) was satisfactorily fulfilled. ii. Copy of Government Ordinance No. 1 of 27 January 2022 amending and supplementing the Government Emergency Ordinance No. 195/2002 for traffic on public roads, published in the Official Journal No. 89 of 28 January 2022. iii. Copy of Law No. 383 of 29 December 2022 regarding some measures to improve the efficiency of road traffic monitoring, published in the Official Journal No. 1279 of 30 December 2022. iv. Copy of Government Decision No. 682 of 25 May 2022 for the approval of the National Road Safety Strategy, published in the Official Journal No. 535 of 31 May 2022 and Annexes,  including the Statement of reasons, published in the Official Journal No. 535 of 31 May 2022. v. Copy of Government Decision No. 144 of 22 February 2022 for the amendment of annexes no. 1 and 2 to the National Strategy on road safety for the period 2022-2030, approved by Government Decision no. 682/2022, published in the Official Journal No. 157bis on 23 February 2023. vi. Copy of Report No. 2707913 of 6 June 2022 regarding the Analysis of road traffic accidents and Annex, issued by the General Inspectorate of the Romanian Police – Traffic Directorate. vii. Copy of Government Ordinance No. 3 of 27 January 2022 amending and supplementing Law no. 265/2008 regarding the management of traffic safety on the road infrastructure, published in the Official Journal No. 91 of 28 January 2022. viii. List of changes to traffic rules legislations in the period 2020 – 2030, issued by the Ministry of Transport on 25 January 2024. ix. Copy of Law No. 302 of 15 November 2022 amending paragraph 1 of Article 64 of the Government Emergency Ordinance No. 195/2002 on traffic on public roads, published in the Official Journal No. 1107 of 17 November 2022. x. Copy of Law No. 134 of 13 May 2022 amending GEO No. 195/2002 on traffic on public roads, published in the Official Journal No. 477 of 13 May 2022. xi. Copy of Government Decision No. 1075 of 4 October 2021 amending and supplementing the Regulation implementing the Emergency Ordinance of the Government no. 195/2002 on traffic on public roads, approved by Government Decision No. 1.391/2006, published in the Official Journal No. 954 of 6 October 2021. xii. Copy of Government Emergency Ordinance No. 13 of 4 February 2020 amending GEO 195/2002 on traffic on public roads, published in the Official Journal No. 102 of 11 February 2020. xiii. Copy of Law No. 85 of 12 April 2022 amending Government Ordinance No. 43/1997 on the road regime, for amending and supplementing the Emergency Ordinance of the Government no. 195/2002 on traffic on roads public law, as well as for the completion of the Law No. 255/2010 on expropriation for the cause of public utility, necessary for the achievement of objectives of national, county and local interest, published in the Official Journal No. 366 of 13 April 2022. xiv. Copy of Law No. 278 of 4 October 2022 amending GEO 195/2002 on traffic on public roads, published in the Official Journal No. 967 of 4 October 2022. xv. Copy of Ministerial Order No. 2261 of 23 August 2022 for the approval of the Financing Guide of the Used Vehicle Scrapping Program, published in the Official Journal No. 832 of 24 August 2022. xvi. Copy of Report No. 2715218/54/LMD of 7 October 2022 on road safety controls, issued by the General Inspectorate of the Romanian Police – Traffic Directorate. xvii. Copy of Ministerial Order No. 2262 of 8 November 2022 regarding the amendment of the Order of the Minister of Transport No. 1679/2017 for the approval of the Methodology for contracting the road safety impact assessment and road safety audit, for the designation and work of road safety auditors, of the framework contracts concluded by the Romanian Road Authority - R.R.A. with investors, contractors/mandated designers, as well as with road safety auditors, published in the Official Journal No. 1183 of 9 December 2022. xviii. Copy of Ministerial Order No. 2263 of 8 November 2022 regarding the amendment and completion of the Order of the Minister of Transport no. 606/2017 for the approval of the Road Safety Inspection Contracting Methodology, of the Framework Contract concluded between the Romanian Road Authority – R.R.A. and road administrators, of the methodologies for carrying out road safety inspections, of the list of mandatory provisions that can be ordered by the road safety inspection report, of the model of the nominal control ID, of the model of the reports of the finding and sanctioning of contraventions ,  equipment and registration of inspection and control vehicles, as well as the equipment necessary to carry out road safety inspections, published in the Official Journal No. 1189 of 12 December 2022. xix. Copy of the Report presenting road sectors where speed limit reductions were implemented on the basis of the Annex to the Report No. 2707913 of 6 June 2022 regarding the ‘Analysis of road traffic accidents’, issued by the General Inspectorate of the Romanian Police – Traffic Directorate and the corresponding 16 reports justifying the implementation of speed limit reductions. xx. Copy of Ministerial Order No. 1218 of 1 July 2022 amending the Regulations on the periodic technical inspection of vehicles registered in Romania - RNTR 1, approved by the Ministerial Order No. 2.133/2005, published in the Official Journal No. 711 of 15 July 2022. xxi. Copy of Government Emergency Ordinance No. 195 of 12 December 2002 regarding traffic on public roads, published in the Official Journal No. 958 of 28 December 2002 and republished in the Official Journal No. 670 of 3 August 2006. xxii. Copy of Law No. 265 of 7 November 2008 regulating the management of traffic safety on road infrastructure, published in the Official Journal No. 777 of 20 November 2008. xxiii. Copy of Ministerial Order No. 2133 of 8 December 2005, published in the Official Journal No. 1160 of 21 December 2005. Analysis: The justification and substantiating evidence provided by the Romanian authorities cover all constitutive elements of the milestone. The following legislative changes promoting road safety shall be introduced: - enforcement of the rules governing compliance, higher penalties for breaches of the law; Government Ordinance No. 1 of 27 January 2022 (hereinafter referred to as GO 1/2022) amended Government Emergency Ordinance No. 195 of 28 December 2002 (hereinafter referred to as GEO 195/2002), setting out the main legislation regarding traffic rules on public roads, to introduce provisions defining illegal behaviour on public roads, increasing sanctions for existing rules, and improving the process for imposing sanctions. In particular: (i) Article I(2) introduces a new sanction allowing the police to withhold the driving licence when the driver could not be tested to determine the alcohol/psychoactive substances concentration in the exhaled air and for which a medical examination was necessary to confirm the presence of these substances; (ii) paragraphs 6 and 9 under Article I, introduced new administrative penalties such as the interdiction to drive a vehicle in Romania using a driving licence issued by a foreign authority for which there is a permanent Court decision to annul that driving licence; (iii) paragraph 12 of the same article introduced a new contravention for aggressive behaviour in traffic; (iv) paragraph 15 introduced a new contravention for failure to comply with the obligation to permanently keep clean the windscreen, rear window and side windows of vehicles, agricultural or forestry tractors, if this restricts the visibility while driving; (v) paragraph 17 introduced new contraventions and an increase to a class III sanction from the previous class II, including the suspension of the driving licence for 60 days for not granting priority to pedestrians or vehicles, for aggressive behaviour resulting in an accident or for non- compliance with overtaking rules; (vi) Article I(20) introduced new contraventions and a class IV sanction from the previous class III sanction, including the suspension of the driving license for 90 days for unjustified driving on highway emergency lanes or non-compliance with the overtaking rules, in case it caused a traffic accident producing vehicle or material damages; (vii) Article I(21) introduced new contraventions and a class IV sanction from the previous class III sanction, including the suspension of the driving license for 120 days for exceeding with more than 70 km/h the maximum allowed speed limit, not stopping at the red light at railway level crossing or for various illegal driving manoeuvres such as U-turns on highways, changing traffic direction by crossing unallowed sections of the road; (viii) paragraph 23 of this article increased the suspension of the right to drive from 90 days to 180 days when the driver was investigated for an offense against traffic safety on public roads, in case the accident included victims or the Court ruled for the case to be classified, dismissed, postponed or the driver was convicted. In accordance with Article 98(4) of GEO 195/2002, the sanction classes are defined as follows: (i) class I refers to 2 or 3 fine points; (ii) class II refers to 4 to 5 fine points; (iii) class III refers to 6 to 8 fine points; (iv) class IV refers to 9 to 20 fine points, and (v) class V refers to 21 to 100 fine points, where one fine point represents 10% of the minimum national gross wage, as stated under Article 98(2) of the same Government Emergency Ordinance. GO 1/2022 was published in the Official Journal No. 89 on 28 January 2022 and entered into force on 31 January 2022, in accordance with Article 12(1) of Law 24/2000 on the rules of legislative technique for the drafting of legislative acts. - monitoring of road offences by automatic equipment (video cameras, sensors); Law No. 383 of 29 December 2022 regarding some measures to improve the efficiency of road traffic monitoring was published in the Official Journal No. 1279 on 30 December 2022 (hereinafter referred to as Law 383/2022) and entered into force on 2 January 2023, in accordance with Article 12(1) of Law 24/2000 on the rules of legislative technique for the drafting of legislative acts. Its Article 1 establishes the Integrated Road Traffic Monitoring System on public roads in Romania (so-called ‘e-SIGUR’), which is complementary to the Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS). Article 2 of the Law specifies that road traffic monitoring is performed by means of intelligent transport systems. Furthermore, paragraph (a) of Article 3(1) and Article 4(1) provide that e-SIGUR relies on technical and communications systems described in the Law as any equipment, including component elements of intelligent transport systems, which allows to automatically collect images, sounds, information on the speed of a vehicle, information on weather conditions or other relevant information for the purpose of road traffic monitoring. On page 2 of the statement of reasons of Law 383/2022, a specific reference is made to video cameras and sensors as the type of equipment to be used for such monitoring purposes. - reduction of speed limits in specific areas or roads depending on accidents data/risk analysis and best practices at EU level […]; Government Decision No. 682 of 25 May 2022 approving the National Road Safety Strategy (hereinafter referred to as GD 682/2022), published in the Official Journal No. 535bis on 31 May 2022 and entered into force on the same date, in accordance with Article 12(3) of Law 24/2000 on the rules of legislative technique for the drafting of legislative acts. GD 682/2022 introduced a specific objective, namely OS2, aiming to reduce speed limits in certain areas or roads based on data from risk analysis and best practices at EU level, introducing speed management and mandatory safety features, and revision of traffic rules, including with regard to priority for vulnerable users (page 18). This objective has corresponding actions within Annexes 1 (page 13) and 2 (pages 35 and 36) of the Strategy, as amended by Government Decision No. 144 of 22 February 2022, which refer to: i) the identification of road sectors where speed limits should be reduced and ii) implementing reduced speed limits, to eliminate the risk areas referred to as hotspots on the national road network. Government Decision No. 144 of 22 February 2022 entered into force on 23 February 2023 with its publication in the Official Journal No. 157bis, in accordance with Article 12(3) of Law 24/2000 on the rules of legislative technique for the drafting of legislative acts. Within this framework and following the above-mentioned actions, the authorities produced Report No. 2707913 of 6 June 2022 (“Analysis of road traffic accidents”), which sets out the methodology, checks, and results, and identifies 171 national road accident hotspots per each county/highway. In particular, the Annex to Report No. 2707913 identified 75 of such hotspots for which speed limits were proposed to be lowered. Following the identification of the hotspots, Romania took actions to implement reduced speed limits. In this regard, the authorities provided additional reports issued by the national road administrator and the Traffic Police confirming the reduction of speed limits in several of the identified hotspots. Furthermore, in accordance with the Safe System approach, as reflected in the EU Road Safety Policy Framework 2021-2030 - Next steps towards "Vision Zero", better vehicle construction, improved road infrastructure and lower speeds have the capacity to reduce the impact of car crashes preventing deaths and serious injuries. In this regard, Romania approved Law No. 383/2022 setting-up e-SIGUR, a system of national interest for monitoring road traffic, designed and implemented according to similar tools in other EU countries, such as in France, Iceland or Bulgaria, considered as best practices. As stated under paragraph a) of Article 10 (2) of Law No. 383/2022, one of the functions of e-SIGUR is to identify any breaches of the maximum permissible speed limit of vehicles on a specific road sector. - […] introduction of speed management system and mandatory safety features […]; Articles 7(3), 9 and 10 of Law 383/2022 provide for e-SIGUR to collect data on vehicles’ speed to create alerts on possible traffic offences, including as regards exceeding speed limits for a given category of vehicle or road section. Article 10 (2) sets out the following mandatory safety features based on which e-SIGUR detects deviations from traffic rules affecting traffic safety, namely: (i) the maximum speed limit for the category of vehicle on a certain road sector; (ii) prohibitions or restrictions to drive a vehicle on one of the lanes/direction of the road; (iii) compliance with the red traffic light; (iv) the prohibition to drive a vehicle on public roads which has a suspended registration; (v) rules regarding railway level crossing; and (vi) the prohibition to adopt an aggressive behavior when driving vehicles on public roads. Furthermore, Article 9 of this Law specifies that the system also collects for this purpose data regarding sounds, weight and gauge of the vehicles, information on atmospheric conditions, road traffic signposting and the status of road infrastructure, processed to ensure safety traffic. Moreover, as presented under the EU Road Safety Policy Framework 2021-2030 - Next steps towards "Vision Zero", GD 682/2022 established a set of eight key performance indicators to measure progress regarding road safety, namely: speed, use of safety belt, protective equipment, alcohol, driver distraction, vehicle and infrastructure safety and post-collision care (page 27). These eight key performance indicators, along with indicators on deaths and serious injuries, represent the basis for monitoring progress towards achieving the objective of moving towards zero fatalities due to road transport by 2050 at EU level. - […] revision of traffic rules including priority for vulnerable users; Romania provided a list of amendments (referred to in the evidence mentioned under point viii above – ‘List of changes to traffic rules legislations in the period 2020 – 2030, issued by the Ministry of Transport on 25 January 2024’) to the traffic rules legislation, including with regard to priority for vulnerable users. These amendments include: i. Article I(4) of Government Ordinance No. 3 of 27 January 2022 amended the definition of ‘vulnerable road users’ in Article 3(o) of Law No. 265/2008 regarding traffic safety management on road infrastructure, and defined them as road users who do not use motorized vehicles, especially cyclists and pedestrians, as well as users of two-wheeled motorized vehicles. This Government Ordinance was published in the Official Journal No. 91 on 28 January 2022 and entered into force on 31 January 2022, in accordance with Article 12(1) of Law 24/2000 on the rules of legislative technique for the drafting of legislative acts. ii. Article 54(1) and recital (i) of Article 100(3) of Government Ordinance No. 1 of 27 January 2022 amending GEO 195/2002 on traffic on publi