The long-awaited Pelješac bridge is not only an extremely demanding project, but of strategic importance to both Croatia and the European Union, and one of the most significant infrastructure projects to ever take place in the country’s history.
As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 10th of October, 2019, the contract for the construction of access roads to Pelješac bridge and the Ston bypass with the companies Strabag and Avax finally ended the lengthy tender procedure dogged by appeals and complaints, and now construction can finally begin.
A new visualisation has also been released on what Pelješac bridge and the surrounding access roads should look like when the works are completed.
The Austrian Strabag will build the section Duboko – Sparagovići/Zaradeže section, while the Greek Avax will build the section of the Ston bypass and the Sparagovići/Zaradeže – Prapratno and Prapratno – Doli sections. In total, these roads amount to about thierty kilometres of access roads.
The Minister of Maritime Affairs, Transport and Infrastructure, Oleg Butković, said that by signing the contract, the first phase of the tender was now completed, that the construction of access roads can now finally begin and that there should be no problems in the construction itself, but that one could still never really know what might happen in the future.
He added that this is a demanding project, and one of the most important infrastructure projects in the country.
Avax’s CEO, Christos Ioannou, said the Greek company attaches great importance to the construction of the Ston bypass and the Sparagovići/Zaradeže – Prapratno and Prapratno – Doli sections, and is proud to be part of a project which carries such a level of importance for Croatia.
He emphasised that the project will be completed on time and be done well, while Strabag’s director, Veljko Nižetić, emphasised the fact that the Pelješac bridge project is also important for Strabag, which has been operating in Croatia for more than twenty years now.
According to him, the guarantee that their part of the project will be successfully completed is the fact that Strabag has solid financial stability, technical knowledge and a thousand employees in Croatia. The works, he said, will start very soon, in accordance with the contract.
A contract for the construction of the mainland-Pelješac bridge access roads, worth 2.08 billion kuna (excluding VAT), was signed on April the 23rd last year between representatives of Croatian Roads (Hrvatske Ceste) and the Chinese consortium China Road and Bridge Corporation, with 85 percent of the eligible costs being financed by EU funds.
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Poslovni dnevnik/YouTube
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