HÀ NỘI — The Thăng Long Project Management Board sent the fesibility study report of the 64km-highway connecting northern Ninh Bình province and central Thanh Hoá province to the transport ministry for approval.

The highway is planned to have six lanes with a total width of 32.25m and a designed speed of 120kmph. In the first phase of the project, four lanes will be constructed with an investment of nearly VNĐ14 trillion (US$616 million) in three years. The estimated payback time is some 18 years.

The highway starts at km 274+111,86 in Mai Sơn Commune, Yên Mô District, Ninh Bình Province, and ends at km 337+478,11 in Tân Phúc commune, Nông Cống District, Thanh Hoá Province, crossing 10 districts of the two provinces.

According to the Vietnam News Agency, the government recently delivered to the National Assembly the pre-feasibility study reports of some parts of the North-South Expressway for the 2017-20 period, with a total investment of VNĐ120 trillion ($5.3 billion).

According to the plan, from 2017 to 2020, highways connecting Cao Bồ District (Nam Định Province) with Bãi Bọt District (Hà Tĩnh Province), Cam Lộ District (Quảng Trị Province) with La Sơn District (Thừa Thiên-Huế Province), Nha Trang City (Khánh Hoà Province) with Dầu Giây Town (Đồng Nai Province) and Mỹ Thuận 2 Bridge will be prioritised for construction. These projects will be implemented under the public-private partnership (PPP) model with build-operate-transfer (BOT) contracts.

The capital allocated from the State budget will be VNĐ55 trillion ($2.42 billion), including some VNĐ14.2 trillion ($625 million) for land clearance, VNĐ27.7 trillion ($1.2 billion) for PPP projects and VNĐ13.2 trillion ($580 million) for public-invested construction items. Investors will contribute some VNĐ64 trillion ($2.8 billion), including VNĐ12.7 trillion ($560 million) of owners’ equity and VNĐ51 trillion ($2.2 billion) of loans. — VNS