Vehicles travelling on Trung Luong - My Thuan expressway. (Photo: VNA)
According to the ministry, expressways play a crucial role in national development,reducing travel time between regions, promoting socio-economic growth, andensuring national security and defence, both at the state and local levelswhere expressways pass through.
In the proposal, the ministry said that vehicles using expressways will save acertain amount compared to travelling on national highways.
Currently, each vehicle saves about 5,265 VND (0.22 USD) per kilometre when usingthe Cau Gie - Ninh Binh, Ho Chi Minh City - Trung Luong and Ho Chi Minh City - LongThanh - Dau Giay expressways.
This cost-saving is achieved through a 25% reduction in vehicle operatingexpenses and a 75% reduction in travel time.
Passenger vehicles with 30 seats or more save the most, with an estimatedaverage of 12,348 VND (0.51 USD) per kilometre while trucks under two tonnessave 1,974 VND (0.08 USD).
For commuters, using expressways will lead to a 60% reduction in travel time.
As per the national socio-economic development strategy for the 2021-2030period, the goal is to have about 5,000 kilometres of expressways nationwide by2030, out of the total planned length of 9,014 kilometres.
To achieve this goal, initial investment capital for construction, management,and operation until 2030 is estimated at around 813 trillion VND (over 34million USD).
For the 2021-2025 period, about 393 trillion VND (16.5 million USD) is neededto complete 2,043 kilometres and commence the construction of 925 kilometres ofexpressways, according to the ministry.
Collecting tolls for expressway use through booths is one of the tools andsolutions aimed at enhancing management efforts. This approach helps balancethe flow of vehicles on expressways and existing national highways, enablingload control, monitoring and restricting vehicles that do not meet standards,and prohibiting their travel on expressways.
These measures contribute to improving the effectiveness of expresswayoperations and enhancing the benefits they bring.
The collected toll fees will be contributed to the State budget and utilisedaccording to regulations on budget allocation. This allocation prioritisesinvestment funds, management, and road maintenance.
It also supports road investment projects through the Build-Operate-Transfer(BOT) contract model, especially in cases affected by traffic diversion due tothe opening of the expressway routes (compared to the initial terms of projectcontracts).
The mechanism for sharing toll revenue is based on the investment ratio of boththe central and local budgets participating in expressway investment projects./.
VNA
