Thursday, 17th September 2009 - 15:12CET
Reconstruction of major roads starts in 2010
The Garibaldi Road project.
The Malta Transport Authority has just issued tenders for the re-construction and upgrading of four major roads in a €45 million project which will be co-funded by the EU.
The project involves the reconstruction and upgrading of Council of Europe Road and Garibaldi Avenue in Luqa, the upgrading of the Sea Passenger Terminal access road in Floriana/Marsa, the reconstruction of Marfa Road, Mellieha and the reconstruction and upgrading of part of the road from Mgarr to Victoria in Gozo.
Works on the four projects which form part of the Trans European Road Network (TEN-T),are expected to commence mid-next year and will be completed by 2011.
The Trans-European Road Network are a planned set road, rail, air and water transport networks designed to serve the entire continent of Europe.
The European Commission will be funding 85%of the costs while the Maltese government will fund the remaining 15%. The Government will also be funding an additional € 12 Million of works related to deviation routes, works on adjacent roads and services.
Tenders for a second phase, including the construction of parts of the Mellieħa Bypass, Mellieħa and the construction of a new junction at December 13th Street, Marsa, will also be substantially funded by the EU. The tenders are expected to be issued by mid-2010.
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Comments
Idea-why dont we stop these petty VRT tests until all our roads are restructured?
I visited Germany for 3 days last year. On my way there, driving the 4 lane AutoBahn, there was a 1 km straight stretch all torn out for resurfacing. Workers painted temporary yellow lines for the drivers to follow instead of the white lines.
To my suprise, they used a yellow paint that when it dried, it peeled off like a sticker, and guess what !!!! On the 3rd day on my way back to Frankfurt all the works have been completed as if nothing had ever happened ... but hey ... 25 workers did the job day and night ..... and all this work was completed in less than 3 days.
Also note that the hundreds of kilometers of AutoBahn are built on an 80 cm layer of heavy duty, professionally laid tarmac ... no wonder they last for ever .....
That's an example we should follow !!! We're both EU countries !!!!!!
I hope that the plans for the new junction in 13th December Road will be around the current junction which take the vehicles from this road up to Marsa By Pass. Back in the 1970s, this junction was not deigned to take all those cars now going towards Mriehel By Pass and Sta. Venera Tunnels. The curves and ridiculously narrowing at the top, not to mention the badly planned road markings give priority to a less important and useful passage for those coming from the right.
This junction could be redesigned to manage the huge volume of traffic with flows and which could allow a better flow without the need to tilt during peak times.
On a similar note,ADT should also solve the daily morning traffic problem at the Qormi roundabout up to Luqa. The road leading to this roundabout narrows at certain points which cause daily unnecessary delays. The narrow parts can be easily and cheaply arranged since the adjacent land is just an excessively large bare center strip. If any official from ADT uses this road, he would surely have also included this minor alteration in the plans.
i hope these new roads will not be like, as you commented :
"first-class like the Zebbug-Rabat road and guaranteed to last for 25 years"
because when i passed from there last week driving towards zebbug. Cracks are already appearing.
Maltese road construction is of such a low standard its embarrasing, i mean that road hasnt even been there 5 years has it?
I think you are refering to Triq il-Htajriet - Mosta. True true... it's been promised and repromised but has not been finished yet. Shame on the authorities.
Maybe with the €45 million project in road re-construction and upgrading, Malta’s rating in the global competitiveness rankings of 133 world economies will rank better or at least be at par with crisis-hit Zimbabwe and the war stricken Ivory Coast......hopefully and will take less than time than the reconstruction of Manuel Dimech Bridge .
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090913/local/roads-in-malta-worse-than-zimbabwe-report
I just hope that these new roads have the same grip as found in those abroad. Although un-potholed roads is already a bonus for all us, grip quality is essetial as well. For some reason, the mix used for tarmac is still inferior from EU roads. All our roads, even these new ones lose grip with time. This is because our 'zrara' is not good at all for roads. It becomes polished instead of breaking down slowly. One fine example is the Valletta ring road, Marsa main cross road, exiting St Venera tunnels etc etc. In the wet, braking is impossible even at normal speeds. I believe this is the main cause for all the bumper to bumper collisions we see every time it rains.
Let's see what the excuses will be, these ones have been used so far:
Ghax ix-xita zammithna
The foundations we found were not what we expected
Il-Xmas u l-festi telfu ftit
Bdil fil-pjanijiet telfuna ftit
Of course we're all happy they're doing some more roads (FINALLY!), but we also know the drill ormaj.
At the Zabbar to M’scala bypass as you seem to know the top part is all but finished, correct me if I’m wrong but I don’t see any drain system anywhere for rain water, ARE WE GOING TO HAVE THE SAME FLOODING PROBLEMS EVEN AFTER SPENDING 9 MILLION EUROS??
keep this up.
However lets hope it doesnt mean that its takes 3 or 4 years to complete, narrowing the road or not embanking the sharp corners, lets get someone who actually knows how to build a road to do it please, after all its what we deserve.