Article · Geopolitics · Money and markets · Lithuania
Lithuania's presidency revives the Vilnius metro, this time as a shelter. What the city is already doing and what it could cost
On 20 October 2026, President Gitanas Nausėda's chief adviser Vaidas Augustinavičius told Žinių radijas that the cost-benefit analysis of a Vilnius metro should be updated in the new geopolitical setting: checking whether a metro could be a dual-use project (transport plus shelter for residents) and whether part of it could be financed from the EU's proposed Competitiveness Fund. There is no decision, sum or plan. The city is already procuring pre-design proposals for four rail transit lines, due in mid-2027. The head of the city administration, Adomas Bužinskas, puts a full metro at "up to ten billion euros", against a total city budget of 1.8 billion euros.
The Vilnius metro idea has come back through the presidential palace, not city hall. On 20 October 2026 a presidential adviser suggested recalculating whether underground lines would pay off if they also counted as shelters. The city is meanwhile preparing its own rail transit plan, and the money question is still open: a full metro, according to the head of the city administration, would cost up to ten billion euros.