Brecely: Work on D1 Motorway near Ruzomberok to Start Next Year

Brecely: Work on D1 Motorway near Ruzomberok to Start Next Year

Likavka, May 24 (TASR) – Construction work on the Cebrat motorway tunnel near Ruzomberok (Zilina region) will start at the beginning of next year at the earliest, said Transport, Construction and Regional Development Minister Roman Brecely (a Smer-SD nominee) on Tuesday during an inspection day at the construction site of the Hubova-Ivachnova stretch of the D1 motorway.

Drilling work on a two-kilometre tunnel in the Cebrat massif was halted around a year ago. A slope where one of the entrances should have been located proved to be unstable, and there was a risk of landslides. “It’s a complicated section, as the tunnel’s geology changed during construction. Now we’re seeking an optimal technical solution as well as a way of financing the change in construction. We must find a solution as soon as possible if I’m to keep my promise of completing the D1 motorway in this 450-km section by 2020,” said Brecely.

Rerouting and extending the tunnel by 1.5 kilometres would be the most efficient solution. “We’re currently examining all the possible measures, but the most realistic seems to be the one with a tunnel entrance in the [district] of Ruzomberok,” stated investment director of the National Highway Company (NDS) Vladimir Drienovsky.

“At the moment we expect an increase in the cost of the tunnel of around €100 million. We’ll search for resources for its financing. It’s possible that we’ll resolve this via European funds, as this change is exceptional, nobody counted on it,” said Brecely. Other work has been postponed because of tunnel-related problems, as surface work needs to be synchronised with the tunnel’s construction.

Building work on the aforementioned D1-motorway section was launched in December 2013. According to the original schedule, it should have been completed in June 2017. The section should have begun at the Hubova intersection and reached the Cebrat tunnel via the Vah River valley. The route was meant to continue around the villages of Likavka, Martincek and Liskova and end near the village of Ivachnova (all in Zilina region), where the road should have joined the existing D1 motorway in the direction of Poprad.