Second Greater Mekong Tender

Project Status Active The project will i develop a new four-lane arterial expressway between bago bago region and kyaikto mon state of about 64 kilometers km along the greater mekong subregion gms east-west economic corridor ewec ii build the governments capacity to develop and manage expressways meeting international standards and iii ensure road safety in the bago-kyaikto corridor. The gms corridors are the backbone of myanmars transport system. The ewec connects da nang with yangon and its special economic zone of thilawa and then onwards to pathein. The thailand lao peoples democratic republic and viet nam sections of the corridor have been completed to international standards with border facilities improved. Improvements to this ewec corridor will reduce national transport costs and improve regional connectivity with thailand and onwards to the rest of the gms region. However most of the corridors in myanmar including ewec has only two lanes with pavement condition ranging from poor to fair. Road safety is a serious sector issue with myanmars road crash fatality rate being among the highest in southeast asia region. The alignments are long and cross urban areas and the low design standards with mixed road users motorized and non-motorized vehicles pedestrians and animals make it unsafe for speeds higher than 60 km per hour. The project will address capacity issues of the road between bago-kyaikto along the ewec where the current two-lane road experiences high traffic. A pre-feasibility study prepared by the japan international cooperation agency jica showed that this section would reach capacity between 2020 and 2025. Upgrading the currently existing road is not the preferred solution as its widening would involve large resettlement impacts and because the alignment of the road is long and winding in several areas. The project proposes the construction of a new bago-kyaikto expressway with 4-lanes shorter by 32 km than the current alignment which will halve travel time. This expressway will be about 64 km long and include a 2. 3 km long new bridge across the sittaung river. An arterial highway network established in support of economic development regional economic growth and international industrial competitiveness in a way that is safe environmentally-friendly and efficient.