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Austrian construction group Strabag will modernise the A10 Oswaldibergtunnel for Asfinag, Austria’s national motorway operator. Work on both tubes, each 4.3km long, will start this month and be finished in June 2017. The €34 million contract includes upgrading the road and tunnel surfaces as well as reinstalling all electrical and mechanical equipment. Thomas Birtel, chief executive of the Strabag Group, said in a statement that the contract will be covered by the group’s construction, engineering and c

The Moroccan Government intends for the country’s first PPP construction projects to be launched in 2016. Morocco’s Ministry for Infrastructure, Transport and Logistics is currently carrying out studies on over 20 PPPs. The road projects built under PPPs include the Guercif-Nador West Med, Tanger-Tétouan, Safi-Marrakech, Béni Mellal-Fès-Meknès and Agadir-Guelmim motorways.

The contract for a major highway project in Algeria worth US$242.3 million has been awarded to a consortium. The work involves building a 31km urban highway connecting the port of Skikda to the country’s East-West highway. Portuguese contractor Teixeira Duarte-Engenharia e Construccoes forms part of a consortium with Algerian groups Sero EST Batna and Nardjess Travaux Publics. The new highway will have three lanes in each direction and has to be completed within 24 months.

A Danish newspaper has learned of a significant European Union funding gap for one of Europe’s most ambitious transportation road and rail projects. The Fehmarn Belt Fixed Link would connect the German island of Fehmarn with the Danish island of Lolland. A submersed tunnel will cross the 18km-wide Fehmarn Belt, or Fehmarn Strait, in the Baltic Sea. Last February news emerged that contractors had revamped their cost estimates, adding nearly €1.2 billion to the project. This put the final cost of the 18

How to avoid cars and animals meeting head-on has taxed road and highway designers for years. Many schemes exist but some road and overpass designs are more successful than others. Fencing off a roadway is one method of preventing animals, usually large ones such as bears and moose, from wandering into the paths of oncoming vehicles. Another way to keep animals, and people, safe is to build an animal-friendly overpass where the surface appears as a continuation of the nearby landscape – hopefully an e

A key link road in Vietnam has been given the go ahead. The plan is for a new road to run from the Noi Bai - Lao Cai Highway to Sapa District. The construction project has been authorised by the People's Committee of Lao Cai Province in Vietnam. The 27km link road will be challenging to construct however as it will run through some of the country’s mountainous areas. The project will include building five viaducts and four flyovers crossing streams. The project is expected to cost close to US$115 million. T

Germany’s audit office is calling for increased spending on roads maintenance. The audit office has criticised the road and autobahn budget set by Germany’s Ministry of Transport for the 2016 to 2030 period. The German Government has set its €3.8 billion annual spending for the 2011 to 2025 period based on the conditions of roads in 2010. However the audit office says that the future costs will be much higher.

The World Bank will grant Uzbekistan a US$200 million loan for 25 years, including a grace period of five years. The funds will go towards the $240 million Regional Roads Development project that is scheduled to be completed by 2021, according to UzDaily.uz. Uzbekistan’s government also reported that around 117km roads were built in the first half of this year.

The Hungarian government has announced that it will restart work on a new section of the M4 dual carriageway between Albertirsa and Ullo in 2016. Hungarian media reported that the government will invest around €192 million and no funding will come from the European Union, of which the country is a member. The two towns are around 25.5km apart, with Albertirsa closest to the capital Budapest at around 60km. The project should be finished some time in 2019, according to Hungarian media. The announcem

Mexico’s massive infrastructure programme is broadly on track for completion. The country’s Secretariat of Communications and Transport (SCT) has confirmed that 80% of the projects included in the national infrastructure plan (PNI) between 2014 and 2018 are already under development. There are 52 major road infrastructure projects within the PNI. Of these, 17 of the new highways have been completed. A total of 17,000km of new roads have been built in Mexico since 2012. The PNI programme also includes improv