DUSHANBE, July 21, 2015, Asia-Plus — “To-date, more than 315 million somoni have been spent for construction of the Dushanbe to Qurghon Teppa railway,” the first deputy head of Tajik Railways (Tajik state-run railway company), Bahrom Shodiyev, told reporters in Dushanbe on July 21.
According to him, more than 52 million somoni have been spent over the first half of this year for construction of the Vahdat-Yovon railway and rehabilitation of the Rohati-Vahdat-Elok and the Qurghon Teppa – Yovon sections of this railway.
“More than ten domestic and foreign companies are involved in construction of the Dushanbe to Qurghon Teppa railway,” Shodiyev said, adding that the railway is expected to be finished next year.
According to the Ministry of Transport (MoT), construction of the Dushanbe to Qurghon Teppa railway is the first step towards unification of domestic railways in Tajikistan.
We will recall that the Vahdat-Yovon railway that is 46.3 kilometers in length is being built in two stages. The first phase of the project includes construction of 13 kilometers of railway from the railway station Elok in the Vahdat district to the railway station Gambuloq in the Roudaki district. The second phase includes construction of a 33.3-kilometer railway from the Gambuloq station to the railway station Yovon-2 that will connect the railways Dushanbe-Vahdat and Yovon-Qurghon Teppa.
The present railway link joining the Tajik capital and Qurghon Teppa, which is 429 kilometers in length, runs across the territory of Uzbekistan and the Uzbek authorities have suspended rail traffic to the Tajik southern Khatlon province.
The Vahdat-Yovon railway will link the country”s central part with the southern province of Khatlon and will make it possible to shorten the distance by 152 kilometers.
