Proposing 6 special mechanisms for urban railway construction in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City

The Government emphasizes that urban railways are the "backbone" of the urban public transport system, and investment in urban railway development is an objective necessity.

On the afternoon of February 13, on behalf of the Government, Minister of Transport Tran Hong Minh presented a report on the draft Resolution of the National Assembly on piloting a number of specific and special mechanisms and policies to develop the urban railway network system in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

According to Minister Tran Hong Minh, urban railways are the "backbone" of the urban public transport system. Investment in urban railway development is an objective necessity, an important and fundamental solution for modern and sustainable urban development, associated with environmental protection and climate change response.

Therefore, the draft Resolution outlines 6 specific policy groups including: Capital mobilization; Investment implementation procedures; Urban development according to the TOD model (urban development model oriented towards public transport development); Railway industry development, technology transfer and human resource training; Construction materials and dumping site policies; Regulations specifically applicable to Ho Chi Minh City.

Here, for the group of policies on capital mobilization, the Prime Minister is allowed to decide on the arrangement of medium-term and annual public investment plans for localities; use sources of increased revenue, annual savings of the central budget and other legal capital sources without having to follow the order of priority; mobilize ODA capital and preferential loans without having to prepare a project proposal.

The City People's Council is responsible for arranging medium-term and annual public investment plans using local budget capital, increased revenue sources, expenditure savings, and other legal capital sources.

The project is allocated capital over many medium-term periods. The City People's Committee is allocated capital to deploy some work in advance to serve the project (preparation, investment, site clearance, etc.).

Regarding the group of policies on investment procedures, the Government proposes that urban railway projects do not have to establish, appraise, or decide on investment policies, and that the procedures for establishing, appraising, and deciding on investment be implemented immediately.

The City People's Committee is authorized to decide on: dividing the project into component projects and sub-projects when approving the project; deciding on extending the implementation period when the total investment does not increase without having to carry out project adjustment procedures; deciding on projects that do not require architectural design competitions; appointing contractors for consulting, non-consulting, construction and installation packages and investors.

The City People's Committee is also given an advance from the local budget for the following year to implement the project on schedule; is allowed to establish a front-end engineering design (FEED) instead of the basic design and assign the investor to decide and approve the remaining design steps.

In addition, the total investment and estimated budget are applied with the norms and unit prices announced by international organizations and similar projects in the world; regulations on compensation, support, resettlement and land recovery are also stipulated.

The Government emphasizes that urban railways are the "backbone" of the urban public transport system, and investment in urban railway development is an objective necessity.

Regarding the group of policies on urban development according to the TOD model, the Government proposes to stipulate that when establishing and adjusting TOD planning, it is allowed to decide on criteria different from the standards to exploit land funds and added value from land.

The City People's Committee is authorized to decide on the transfer of land use planning targets in the TOD area. When making detailed plans for construction projects, the construction locations do not have to go through relevant planning adjustment procedures.

Consider tendering to ensure competition

Reviewing this content, Chairman of the Economic Committee Vu Hong Thanh said that the Economic Committee found that the above groups of policies were built on the basis of inheriting specific and special policies that have been approved by the National Assembly in the past in the Capital Law, Resolution No. 172 on investment policy for the North-South high-speed railway project. Therefore, the Committee basically agrees with the Government's proposal.

Providing additional comments on the capital mobilization policy, the Economic Committee proposed to clarify how the additional central budget capital with a target for local budgets to implement the project will be determined in case of reducing or adding more projects compared to the Appendix of the project list attached to the Resolution to avoid legal gaps during the implementation process.

Regarding the order and procedures for investment implementation, the Economic Committee found that the draft Resolution stipulates that urban railway projects and urban railway projects under the TOD model are assigned to contractors to shorten the time of project implementation. According to the Economic Committee, the assignment of contractors for urban railway project packages is appropriate, due to the special nature of this type of project that needs to be accelerated.

However, for urban railway projects following the TOD model, it is recommended to consider implementing the bidding process to ensure competitiveness, transparency and efficiency in exploiting and developing TOD areas.

Source: https://baodaknong.vn/de-xuat-6-co-che-dac-thu-lam-duong-sat-do-thi-tai-ha-noi-tphcm-242754.html