Newly-finished shopping street to be torn up again
City to get its skiable rubbish plant after all
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8 - 14 March 2013 | Vol 16 Issue 10
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Bendtner busted big time
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Denmark’s only English-language newspaper | cphpost.dk LARS JUST
NEWS
Days after students protest against SU reform, it’s revealed more and more students are cheating the system
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Donor nation Lots of money is given to foreign aid, but does it change anything?
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NEWS
More DSB woes ‘DSB in a box’ IT project a total bust and is permanently shelved despite costing 50 million kroner
6 SPORT
Bjarne Riis and his riders are gearing up for a cycling season filled with great promise
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CULTURE
Government reveals massive infrastructure plans
Awards, awards, awards
CHRISTIAN WENANDE
The Roberts hand out more gongs than the Oscars, and there is still another awards show to come
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A 27.5 billion kroner investment in a swifter and greener public transport system gets widespread political backing
T
HE GOVERNMENT is set to invest 27.5 billion kroner into an infrastructure plan to improve public transport. Prime Minister Helle ThorningSchmidt (Socialdemokraterne) said in a press conference last week on Friday that the government will establish an infrastructure fund called Togfonden (The Train Fund) as part of its plan to improve train connections between Denmark’s major cities.
The funds are expected to come from a greater taxation of oil companies outside the oil association, Dansk Undergrunds Consortium (DUC), which are drilling in the North Sea. “The plan will make Denmark greener, better connect the country and provide better infrastructure,” ThorningSchmidt said during the press conference. “The 27.5 billion kroner will be obtained from the oil industry, which has long enjoyed advantageous terms when drilling for oil. All of Denmark should benefit from the oil industry in the North Sea.” DONG Energy looks to be among the energy companies that will face heavier taxation, while oil companies such as Maersk, Shell and Chevron, all part of DUC, will be exempt thanks
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to a recent decision to keep the North Sea oil excavation deal unchanged until the year 2043. The energy minister, Martin Lidegaard (Radikale), said that DONG would probably contribute about 25 percent of the funds garnered from the oil industry. According to Thorning-Schmidt, the oil money would begin to trickle in from 2017 and the infrastructure investments would not be made until the money is there. The rail investment will be the largest in Danish history and will feature the ‘hour model’, meaning that the travel time from Copenhagen to Odense will be an hour, as will the travel time from Odense to Aarhus,
and Aarhus to Aalborg. Furthermore, train lines to Struer and Frederikshavn in Jutland are expected to go electric, and there are also plans to construct a tunnel under the Vejle Fjord Bridge. The lack of an electrical railway network has meant that national rail operators, DSB, have been forced to run with the notorious IC4 trains and eco-unfriendly diesel trains. The IC4 trains will continue to be in use until the electrification is completed over the next 15 years. The plan must be approved by parliament first, but there already seems to be widespread political backing, and opposition party Venstre has cam-
Trains continues on page 6
Is opening! Strandvejen 169, Hellerup! Saturday the 16th of March
REE 6: F 12-1 CREAM ICE
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