(Engineering daily) Nguyen Anh Duong = The Viet nam government has asked agencies to quickly identify and clear land needed for the transnational expressway project.
It wants several related projects to get going this year. By the second quarter of the year, the Ministry of Transport should install milestones for the areas that are to be acquired for the projects, Deputy Prime Minister Trinh Dinh Dung has directed.
According to the government, the existing North-South route transports 45.37 million passengers and 62.27 million tons of cargo next year. By next year, demand will exceed capacity of the existing route by 5.92 million passengers and 14.5 million tons of cargo a year.
However, the North-South Expressway involves a series of major construction projects with large budgets and advanced technologies, and cannot be finished before 2025.
The government has specified eleven components of the North-South Expressway among its top priorities this year. Three of them are publicly funded and the rest will be built under public-private partnerships (PPPs).
Work on two of the three public-funded sections is likely to begin in the second quarter of this year. For the private-funded works, the transport ministry will begin the bidding process in October.
The 11 sections are expected to cost $5.06 billion, with $2.36 billion to be provided by the central government.
