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Baku-Tbilisi-Kars Railway Project to be fully complete in 2012

07 December 2009 17:05 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Rashad Suleymanov - APA-ECONOMICS. The problems in the territory of Georgia concerning the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars Railway Project have been completely eliminated, said the Ministry of Transport of Azerbaijan.

With the involvement of the Georgian side, the area through which the new railway will run has already designed and disputes that arose with local population have been solved, said the ministry.

Work is underway on preparing the site for the railroad and the reconstruction of existing roads.

Meanwhile, a site has chosen for the wheel base station at the Georgian-Turkish border because it is required to change wheels as European standards (1 435 mm) and Soviet standards (1 520 mm) differ.
Besides, a new site has been selected for Georgian-Turkish border tunnel. The project will be ready by as late as mid-2012.

The three countries agreed in February 2007 to build a rail line linking the Azerbaijani capital Baku, the Georgian capital Tbilisi and the Turkish city of Kars. Construction work commenced on November 21, 2007.

As per the agreement, Azerbaijan undertook to extend a $200mln loan to Georgiaâ€™s Marabda-Kartsakhi Railroad LLC for 25 years at 1% interest rate annually. The loan will be spent on construction of a 29km long railroad in Georgia, a ST-2 wheel base in Turkish-Georgian border and rehabilitation of old railway.