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A report from the European Court of Auditors has highlighted the high cost of building roads in Latin America. The report states that it costs seven times more to build roads in Latin America than in Europe. The study compared 24 road projects across Europe and Latin America that were carried out between 2000 and 2013. Each km of road costs around US$116,000 in Germany, $164,000 in Greece, $215,000 in Spain and $218,000 in Poland on average. This compares to $2 million in Mexico, between $800,000 and $1 mil

Explosive demolition has been used to remove an old highway bridge in Pennsylvania. Some 90kg of explosives were used to blast the pre-weakened steel structure of the 87 year-old Masontown Bridge. The redundant steel truss structure lay just 3m from the new bridge now carrying Route 21 over the Monongahela River and connecting Masontown with Monongahela Township. The location of the explosives and the pre-weakening work carried out however meant that the old structure, built in 1925 and upgraded in 1933, fe

In Italy funding is being found to finance work to the Livorno-Civitavecchia highway. Some €2 billion worth of private funding is to be made available for the Livorno-Civitavecchia highway project. This funding stream is being set in place due to framework changes being made by CIPE, the Italian interdepartmental committee for economic planning. This will now pave the way for banks to fund the project. Construction works are already underway on a 15km section of the highway.

In Papua New Guinea (PNG) work is now commencing on two key road projects wortha total of US$263 million. Chinese contractors have been awarded the deals to build a four-lane road between Nadzab and Lae and a a 20km road between Kagual Bridge and Kisenopoi Junction. China Railway International (CRI) and China Machinery Engineering Corp (CMEC) will carry out the two projects respectively. Both projects are sections of the Highland Highway with work scheduled to commence in late-2013 to early-2014.

In Oman the Transport and Communications Ministry is launching two tenders for the Adam-Thumrait carriageway dualisation project. The work will see the road upgraded from a single carriageway into a dual carriageway featuring four lanes. The link between Salalah and Muscat will be dualised over a distance of 1,000km. There are studies underway for work to Metan-Al Hashman-Al Shasr road and Al Mazyunah-Sheit road also. The Transport and Communications Ministry is also carrying out studies for dualisation wor

In the Colombian city of Cali, two projects are now in hand that will improve transport connections for commuters. Plans are in hand for a new 62km ring road around the city that would be constructed under the PPP model and cost an estimated US$697 million. A number of Portuguese and Spanish companies are involved in the proposed ring road project, although the opening of the tender process is still some way off as Federal Government approvals have yet to be given. The city will also benefit from the constr

In Rwanda a road rehabilitation project will see the rebuilding of the route connecting Huye and Kitabi. The work on the 53km road will be supervised by Rwanda’s Ministry of Infrastructure and is due for completion by 2017. A loan worth SU$10 million from the Arab Bank for Economic Development (Badea) will help to finance the work on the road, which lies in Rwanda’s Southern Province. Badea is a financial institution owned by 18 Arab countries members of the League of Arab States (LAS). In all, the project

The Ukrainian Government says that the country will see US$26.23 billion of road and highway construction work carried out in the 2013-2018 period. This construction plan forms part of the country’s five-year state economic programme. Financing will come from an array of sources. Funds for the projects will come from private investors, credit facilities, overseas financial organisations and the national budget.

The authorities in India are continuing the process of investment in toll road projects and general road construction. Plans call for some US$27 billion of road projects to be awarded in India by the end of October 2013. Included in the plans are four toll road projects, such as for construction of the Agra-Lucknow expressway, an eight lane highway that will be carried out by Uttar Pradesh Expressways Industrial Development Authority. So far in 2013, only 479km of projects have been awarded by the National

Plans are now in hand to develop the highways of Nicaragua, a Central American country that has suffered from poor infrastructure investment in the past. The funding will come from the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB). Some US$91.5 million has been approved by the IADB to finance highway projects in Nicaragua between 2014 and 2018. While this sum may not seem as substantial as the investment being seen in other countries around the world, it will make an enormous difference to this small Central Ameri