The government has decided to initiate process within a month to find investors for the construction of 76-km Kathmandu-Tarai fast-track road that connects Kathmandu and Terai.
A high-level infrastructure development committee headed by Vice Chairman of National Planning Commission (NPC) Dipendra Bahadur Kshetry took the decision on Thursday.
Following the decision, Ministry of Physical Planning and Works (MoPPW), which is executing this national-priority project, said that it would publish a global notice seeking letter of interest (LoI) from all interested investors for the construction of the expressway within a month.
Though the bid will seek LoI from both international and domestic investors, officials said there will be some special provisions in the favor of domestic investors. They, however, refused to disclose what that would be.
As announced in the past, the fast track would be built under built-own-operate and-transfer (BOOT), said Kshetry. What this means is investors putting in money in the project will operate the expressway for up to 30 years, depending on the contract that it will have with the government, and hand it over to the government after that.
Kathmandu-Tarai fast track is one of the ´national pride projects´ under which the government has announced of the construction of a six-lane highway, sharply reducing travel distance between Kathmandu and Nijgadh section of East-West Highway.
“Investors willing to develop and operate the project will be asked to submit their technical plan and cost details,” said an official at MoPPW. The bid will, thus, make clear how much cost would it need to develop the fast track. Earlier, Asian Development Bank that conducted its feasibility study in 2008 had projected the construction cost could stand at around Rs 67 billion.
More important than the investment amount, the bid will disclose how the international investors respond to the project, enabling the government to know possibility of adopting similar modality for infrastructure development in the future.
Based on the applications received from the interested parties, government will select investor for fast track road through a competitive bidding process, allowing it to execute the project under the BOOT Act, 2006.
Though the high-level steering committee decided to speed up the process of selecting the investor, MoPPW has so far finished the track opening of 51 kilometers only. But officials said they will complete the track opening of another 17 kilometers soon.
“Opening track of 68 kilometers is not a problem because we have already reached an agreement with the locals for land acquisition,” said the MoPPW source.
However, the Ministry has faced difficulty to acquire land for 8-km stretch of the highway in Khokana area of Lalitpur district as locals have demanded huge compensation.
In order to skip the liability, Kshetry said the committee has already instructed the Ministry to look for other alternative alignment. “Once that is finalized, the track opening process will be complete. We are hoping to attain that soon,” he told republica.
Source myrepublica
A high-level infrastructure development committee headed by Vice Chairman of National Planning Commission (NPC) Dipendra Bahadur Kshetry took the decision on Thursday.
Following the decision, Ministry of Physical Planning and Works (MoPPW), which is executing this national-priority project, said that it would publish a global notice seeking letter of interest (LoI) from all interested investors for the construction of the expressway within a month.
Though the bid will seek LoI from both international and domestic investors, officials said there will be some special provisions in the favor of domestic investors. They, however, refused to disclose what that would be.
As announced in the past, the fast track would be built under built-own-operate and-transfer (BOOT), said Kshetry. What this means is investors putting in money in the project will operate the expressway for up to 30 years, depending on the contract that it will have with the government, and hand it over to the government after that.
Kathmandu-Tarai fast track is one of the ´national pride projects´ under which the government has announced of the construction of a six-lane highway, sharply reducing travel distance between Kathmandu and Nijgadh section of East-West Highway.
“Investors willing to develop and operate the project will be asked to submit their technical plan and cost details,” said an official at MoPPW. The bid will, thus, make clear how much cost would it need to develop the fast track. Earlier, Asian Development Bank that conducted its feasibility study in 2008 had projected the construction cost could stand at around Rs 67 billion.
More important than the investment amount, the bid will disclose how the international investors respond to the project, enabling the government to know possibility of adopting similar modality for infrastructure development in the future.
Based on the applications received from the interested parties, government will select investor for fast track road through a competitive bidding process, allowing it to execute the project under the BOOT Act, 2006.
Though the high-level steering committee decided to speed up the process of selecting the investor, MoPPW has so far finished the track opening of 51 kilometers only. But officials said they will complete the track opening of another 17 kilometers soon.
“Opening track of 68 kilometers is not a problem because we have already reached an agreement with the locals for land acquisition,” said the MoPPW source.
However, the Ministry has faced difficulty to acquire land for 8-km stretch of the highway in Khokana area of Lalitpur district as locals have demanded huge compensation.
In order to skip the liability, Kshetry said the committee has already instructed the Ministry to look for other alternative alignment. “Once that is finalized, the track opening process will be complete. We are hoping to attain that soon,” he told republica.
Source myrepublica
