You're reading: Yanukovych attends ceremony to lay new road and rail bridges across Amu Darya

Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov have attended a ceremony to launch the construction of new road and rail bridges across the Amu Darya near the village of Farap, the press service of the Ukrainian president on Thursday. 

The leaders of the two states laid a capsule with notes they made at the site of the construction of the bridges.

Yanukovych praised cooperation between Ukraine and Turkmenistan, as part of which the countries can implement such large-scale joint projects. He said that such projects were more evidence of the friendly relations between Ukraine and Turkmenistan, whose purpose is to improve the welfare of both countries.

The design and construction of road and railway bridges across the Amu Darya in Turkmenabat on the Turkmenabad-Farap highway, currently under reconstruction, are being conducted by Ukraine’s Altcom Road Construction Ltd. The cost of work on the construction of a 1.6-kilometer-long road bridge is $288 million. The bridge will have four lanes, each 3.75 meters wide (two in each direction), and one-meter-wide safety lanes on the outer edges of the roadway. It is also planned to build 1.5-meter-wide pavements on both sides of the bridge.

The cost of the construction of a 1.75-kilometer-long railway bridge is $169 million. According to technical requirements, the bridge is designed for one railway track of the first category.

The road and rail bridges are located 230 meters from each other, and they will be constructed simultaneously. Nearly 1,000 people will be involved in construction work.

The bridges will be of great importance for the development of transport and communication infrastructure in the region and be important elements of the East-West Transport Corridor.