European Railroad Discussion > Cab ride views from Bulgaria

I've come across some cab ride videos from Bulgaria (search for them online) that are very long, 3-7 hours, covering the major East-West routes from Sofia to either Burgas or Varna. I know nothing about the railways in Bulgaria but there are some striking scenes in the cab rides in terms of the track conditions and traffic. At many points the passenger train that you are viewing from is on a double track, electrified right of way, but it frequently has jointed rail and the train is clickity-claking along at a very modest pace. There seem to be slow zones all over the place as well. From Belovo east to Septemvri, the train crosses over to the wrong main at Belovo, seemingly because the second main is out of service. On that double track but really single track segment, weeds grow over the railway in many spots, and there are more slow zones. The other striking thing from what little I've seen so far on these double track lines as that this passenger train isn't meeting anything, freight or passenger. A document on rail modernization in the country from 2009 says "Sofia-Plovdiv railway line modernization amounting to €353 million and completion term year 2014." At Septemvri suddenly new track, ballast, and concrete ties appear and continue to Plovdiv, but that seems like a work in progress in this 2017 video and it certainly doesn't cover west of Septemvri.

Looking at the European Commission website, this mainline is shown on the map:

http://ec.europa.eu/transport/infrastructure/tentec/tentec-portal/map/maps.html?corridor=4

But is the issue that most freight traffic, if it is even much, is moving south of Sofia towards Greece, with little freight traffic headed in the direction of Plovdov and onwards towards Turkey?

Isn't there a longstanding dispute between Turkey and Bulgaria?  May have had an impact on trade.

To an extent I prefer this map, even though it is getting outdated as it shows what is electrified and what is single-track or multi-track.
 http://www.bueker.net/trainspotting/map.php?file=maps/bulgaria/bulgaria.gif

Bulgaria doesn't have a lot of railfreight, 3.65 billion tonne-kilometers, in 2015. Based on what I know, most of it is internal(domestic), what moves Internationally moves towards Romania, Serbia or Turkey. The rail connection to Greece leads to a Secondary non-electrified line in Greece.

Thanks for the info. I also look at the maps on that site frequently even if they might be outdated, because they cover more of the world more consistently than any other site I've seen.