The world's longest highway to be constructed in Russia

Once the newly designed route “Chita-Khabarovsk” is set into operation, the “Moscow-Vladivostok” highway (10 000 km) will be the longest in the world.

The most important sector of the “Chita-Khabarovsk” highway will officially be opened by the end of February.

Government Commission has finished its inspections January 25th, stated official representative of the President of the Russian Federation in the Far East federal district Konstantin Pulikovski. “Two years ago, it took us entire day to get from Skovorodino to Erofei Pavlovicha (Northern settlement in Amur region). Today, this trip takes us no more than two hours,” said Pulikovski.

“In 2004 we plan to bring the road to perfection and set 280 km of hard asphalt into operation. It is planned to asphalt the entire highway by 2008,” stated Pulikovski. “Nothing on this scale has been done in the last 15 years,” remarked he.

The very first decision regarding construction of such highway was considered in the USSR by a Council of Ministers in 1966. The actual construction began in 1978. It was built with an estimated traffic intensity of 3 000 vehicles per day.

The “Chita-Khabarovsk” highway constitutes a part of the transcontinental route which enables a round-the-clock across the entire country—from western borders to the Pacific Ocean. In addition, while being a part of the Eurasian traffic corridor “East-West”, the highway will enable Russian companies to increase efficiency of International cargo transportations as well as to attract new foreign carriers. The highway will connect the entire route map of the Far East region with those base routes of the country, thus creating a new stimulus for further socio-economic development of the Eastern territories.

Nowadays, nearly 30 000 Russian settlements, with its population of 12 million people, are deprived access to the country's main roads. At the same time, a number of Russian drivers rapidly increases. According to the estimates, every 10 families will have eight vehicles by 2010. Taking into account this fact, it becomes of utmost importance to continue developing road networks. Nowadays, Russia existing road networks occupy 900 000 kilometers. However, it is in need of 1,5 million kilometers, reports RIA “Novosti”. 

Source: Izvestia