ERR board chair Erik Roose said this week that the construction tender for the new complex may be announced as open as early as this month.

Heljo Pikhof (SDE), chair of the Riigikogu culture committee, said: "The decision was easy."

"Added to that, the documents ERR submitted to the committee were all in order," she added.

The funding will derive from the Cultural Endowment (Kultuurkapital), and will total €62 million (the overall eventual project cost is estimated at close to €77 million), Pikhof noted.

ERR will also receive additional funds from the sale of the current TV premises on Gonsiori, with the balance to derive from from the sale of properties on Tuisu tänav, also in Tallinn.

Erik Roose said: "Practically everything is now in place. In mid-May, at a scheduled meeting of the Cultural Endowment's supervisory board, that board's chair, Minister of Culture Heidy Purga, will finalize the matter, in line with the committee's recommendations."

Roose added that ERR will be entering the construction tender process via the state's real estate firm, the RKAS, early on this month, while the tender will be open Europe-wide.

He said: "This construction tender means that building firms across Europe will have about four months to submit their bids, by September."

Roose noted that construction prices have been rising compared with the picture five years ago, when the process of building the new ERR TV complex began more intensively.

That inflation has eased somewhat in the last couple of years, he continued.

The original design, produced in 2019 – the Covid pandemic was another factor in the delay – remains essentially unchanged, though one portion of the complex, facing on to the adjacent School XXI, a high school, has been reduced by one floor, mainly due to considerations of neighbors' daylight requirements.

"This is the main change that has taken place. Other than that, the project has not really been altered; it is exactly that which won the [design] competitive process, and we are satisfied with it as things stand," Roose said.

ERR chief: Next step is sale of the old TV complex

Interest from construction firms is yet to be seen, however, as reaching the ground-breaking stage has proven difficult, according to Roose.

"It has been hard for various reasons, including the need to amend the Cultural Endowment legislation, to allow the Cultural Endowment to finance ERR's new TV complex," the public broadcaster's board chair said.

"For this reason there hasn't been any talk [of the actual construction work], but certainly now the time is ripe, if the tender arrives in the next few days or weeks, and indeed all serious construction companies are most welcome."

"Bearing in mind the market situation and that there are few other major projects currently going on in Estonia, the interest ought to be high, so the price should be amenable to both parties," Roose went on.

As for the sale of the curret TV building, on which the full funding of the new complext is contingent, Roose said: "We don't have any documentation on the sale yet, but the plan is that once we have successfully launched the construction tender via the RKAS, the next step will be to start dealing with the sale of the current TV building."

"Following that sale, we will still be able to use the old building, for a further two to three years," Roose added.

The new television complex itself is now due to be completed by or in 2027.

"If everything goes perfectly, which of course cannot always be guaranteed in life, then the nominal construction time will be two to two-and-a half-years. We rather assume that it will take up to three years, from breaking ground," Roose added.

The ground to be broken, a plot currently used as a parking lot, lies between the current Raadio maja (Radio House) on Gonsiori 21 and the Uudistemaja (News House) on Kreutzwaldi 14.

The new ERR building will lead to the creation of an integrated radio, news, and TV complex with everything on the one site.

The somewhat dilapidated existing TV house is a block away, on Gonsiori 27.

Back in 2021, the Riigikogu confirmed a list of nationally important cultural buildings which contained five projects, for instance the refurbishment of the National Library.

A law passed in March this year allows the Cultural Endowment's council, at the proposal of the Minister of Culture and with the approval of the Riigikogu Culture Committee, to decide on the funding of an additional nationally significant cultural building, provided doing so does not affect the completion of those other projects already on the list.

In May last year, Tallinn City Government established the required detailed plan for ERR's new television complex.

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