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Thailand-China railway project likely to suffer new setback

The Thai-Chinese railway scheme is poised to suffer another setback if the Chinese side fails to submit the project’s design document needed to estimate the rail’s costs on time, the Thai media said on March 28.
Thailand-China railway project likely to suffer new setback ảnh 1Illustrative image (Source: The Bangkok Post)

Bangkok (VNA) – The Thai-Chinese railway scheme is poised to suffer anothersetback if the Chinese side fails to submit the project’s design documentneeded to estimate the rail’s costs on time, the Thai media said on March 28.

Earlier, China submitted the project design of the 252.5 km high-speed trainlinking Bangkok and Nakhon Ratchasima, but the content related to constructionmaterials and components was written in Chinese.

The Thai authorities asked China to translate it into English and submit thedocument by the end of this month. If the document is not submitted on time,the 17th meeting of the Thai-Sino panel overseeing the high-speedrailway project to be held in Beijing will be called off.

The project design is about 80 percent complete. The remaining 20 percentincludes the translation of construction materials from Chinese to Thailand.Without the document, the State Railway of Thailand cannot estimate theconstruction costs and set up a reference price necessary for project bidding.

If the 17th meeting is further delayed, the 179 billion THB raildevelopment scheme will also be delayed and this could lead to cancellation.

At this stage it is still not known when the rail development project will besubmitted to the cabinet for approval and even if the construction design iscompleted, Thai authorities still have to assess the health and environmentalimpacts.

Another issue which could hinder the project is the issuing of professionallicences for 300 Chinese engineers working for the project. Under Thai laws,foreign engineers who work for construction project in the country need to passan examination and hold local profession licences.

The Thai Transport Ministry will meet with the Council of Engineers on March 30to discuss the issue. Thai authorities are considering organising exams inChina due to the large number of engineers.

Meanwhile, Japan will submit a full report to Thailand in June on the Thai-Japanesehigh-speed rail project linking Bangkok and Chiang Mai.-VNA
VNA
#Thai-Chinese railway scheme#railway project
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