Mezei István: Urban development in Slovakia (Pécs-Somorja, 2010)
6. Towns along the Hungarian and Slovak border
Cross-border relations tenance rights of institutions are delegated to different levels. That is the reason why, for example, Hungarian regulations make it difficult and complicated to establish ports on the banks of the Danube. Jet skis are banned from the Hungarian section of the river, while they are not on the Slovak side. The different regulations regarding motor cruisers make scheduled service between the two banks difficult. The regulations of flood prevention also create some problems. Whereas on the Slovak side, all of the planned dams have been built, and cycling is also allowed on them (what is more, for Route 63 road traffic has also been planned), on the Hungarian side floods regularly cause damage and dams are not suitable for either cycling or road traffic. This fact will be important for the development of cycling tourism. Whereas the Slovak side can begin the development of services with a completed infrastructure, on the Hungarian side the cycling paths themselves are missing, in most cases. A formal way of cooperation between settlements can be twin-town relations. In the beginning, the twin-town relations between settlements had strong political aspects. In the decades of communist dictatorship they served as a forced Hungarian and Czechoslovak friendship. Solidarity with the Hungarian ethnic minority could only be expressed in a hidden way. After 1990 signing twin-town contracts and the organization of mutual visits, mainly on national holidays, became visible forms of sympathy with the Hungarian people in Slovakia. Strengthening national consciousness manifested itself in increasingly practical forms of cooperation. The cooperation of civil organizations and the particular municipality institutions indicated this trend. The financial support of the European Union, first PHARE CBC, and then INTERREG, brought a change towards profitableness. In the hope of the acquirable money, cooperation increased and dense institutional networks were set up between the settlements on both sides of the border even during the planning period already. This was when euroregions began to be established rapidly along the whole of the border. The prosperity of the relations coincided with the change of government in 1998, when the successive Slovak ultra-nationalist governments that had been in power before were replaced by the (nationalist, without a prefix) bourgeois government in coalition with the Hungarian Coalition Party. 159
