Construction progress to date, with tunnel No. 1, is digging the base roof, cleaning, clearing the ground, making a road to the top trench of the southern tunnel entrance. Leveling the ground, pouring concrete for the foundation of the concrete mixing station, the crushing station of the northern tunnel entrance. With tunnel No. 2, the elevation of base roofs No. 1, 2, 3 has been accepted and the ground of the concrete mixing station has been dug and leveled. Base roofs No. 4, 5 in the north and base roof No. 5 in the south of the tunnel are being dug. Tunnel No. 3, has dug 120/390m of the top trench and 2,000/17,000 m2 of base roof.

According to Mr. Nguyen Tan Dong, Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of Deo Ca Group, representative of the construction contractor, to construct tunnels No. 2 and No. 3 of the North-South expressway component project, Quang Ngai - Hoai Nhon section, it is necessary to build a public service road, including passing through Duc Pho town, Quang Ngai province.

According to the design documents approved by the Ministry of Transport, to access the construction of these tunnels, a new 4.5km service road must be opened, and the forest area to be cleared is about 40,000m2. When implementing the construction, the contractor is allowed to adjust the direction of the service road accordingly based on actual conditions.

The service road was opened for the construction of tunnels 2 and 3 of the Quang Ngai - Hoai Nhon (Binh Dinh) expressway project. Photo: BAO LINH

Based on information research and field surveys, the contractor found that there is an existing residential road about 4-6m wide, currently used for transporting forest products, which can be converted into a service road. Taking advantage of this residential road will shorten the service road from 4.5km to 3.6km and reduce the area of ​​forest that must be cleared.

The construction unit said that this route is located entirely within the production forest land, so they signed a land lease contract and borrowed the existing residential road to level the road surface and renovate the curve to make a service road to access the construction.

According to Resolution No. 273/NQ-UBTVQH15 dated July 11, 2022 of the National Assembly Standing Committee on the policy of changing the purpose of using forests, forest land and rice land from 2 crops or more of the North-South expressway construction project in the East phase 2021-2025, in Appendix No. 02, the total area of ​​forest land in Quang Ngai province that needs to change the purpose of use to implement the project is 43.74 hectares, all of which are production forest land.

The Quang Ngai - Hoai Nhon Expressway Project Management Board said that the site clearance work of the project still has many obstacles, directly affecting the progress of the construction sites. Some sections have not been handed over continuously, there are no access roads, many sections have been handed over but equipment has not been put into construction.

Construction of the Quang Ngai - Hoai Nhon (Binh Dinh) expressway project on the North - South expressway route. Photo: THANH XUAN

Up to now, the locality has handed over 73.3km of the total length of 88km, reaching 83.3%. The contractor has received 58.63km/88km of the site, reaching 66.6%. The accessible site for construction is 51.42km/88km, reaching 58.4%.

The contractor has focused resources to implement the project immediately after the groundbreaking ceremony. Currently, the contractor has deployed 39 construction teams on the site with more than 1,000 personnel and more than 440 pieces of equipment to meet the project's progress requirements. Special attention is paid to deploying the construction teams of 3 tunnels through the mountain, identified as the project's progress critical path, passing through Duc Pho town, Quang Ngai province and Hoai Nhon district, Binh Dinh province, in which, tunnel No. 3 is a special-grade project with a length of 3.2km.

The Quang Ngai - Hoai Nhon section project has a scale of 4 lanes, a design speed of 80km/h, a total investment of more than 20,400 billion VND, a length of 88km, of which the section passing through Quang Ngai province is 60.3km long, passing through Binh Dinh province is 27.7km long, expected to be completed in the third quarter of 2026. The project is invested by Project Management Board 2 (Ministry of Transport).

MANH HUNG