By Lynda Myer
Linking Erzurum to the Black Sea via İspir without interruption, another 20-kilometer section of the Erzurum-İspir-Rize Road was completed and its inauguration ceremony was held by attendance of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Other audience of this ceremony were Minister Adil Karaismailoğlu, General Manager Abdulkadir Uraloğlu and many citizens. Providing the connection among the Black Sea ports and Erzurum, the İspir-Rize Provincial Border Road is one of the important transportation projects, as President said.
He continued: ” It will be able to handle uninterrupted, safe and comfortable vehicle traffic in summer and winter. With the completion of the Kırık and Dallıkavak Tunnels, which are under construction, they will completely complete this project, which is of vital importance for our country, together with Erzurum.”
With indication to that they have officially opened this 20-kilometer road, with 1,5 separate tunnels and a bridge with a total length of 3 kilometers, President Erdoğan stated: “We are connecting Erzurum to the Black Sea and opening Erzurum to the world from the Black Sea. Now Ovit has become the highway for us. When it’s all over, we will completely relax and reach the Black Sea from here. We will go to Bayburt, Gümüşhane Zigana, and from there to Trabzon.”
According to President Erdoğan’s speech, the length of the divided highway has been increased from 49 kilometers in Erzurum to 620 kilometers, and the coming year is determined date for inauguration of a significant part of the tunnel and road projects that are currently under construction.
“We are working hard to rebuild and build Erzurum from all sides. I wish the projects to be opened today will be beneficial for Erzurum,” Erdogan said.
The location of commencing İspir-Rize Provincial Border Road is the intersection of the D-5 State Road and the D-050 Road, and it merges with the Ovit Tunnel at 925 km west of İspir. Within the scope of the project, 593 tunnels with a total length of 1 meters, including the Özbağ-332 Tunnel of 2 meters, Özbağ-516 Tunnel of 441 meters and Özlüce Tunnel of 3 meters, each of which consists of double tubes, and the Özbağ Bridge with a length of 30 meters were built.
Considering the mountainous terrain on the route that allows slow and heavy flow of traffic in the existing road, this project provides a fast, safe and comfortable transportation service to the citizens with the quality of a divided road. Additionally, dividing the road in the north-south axis which connects the Eastern Black Sea to Eastern Anatolia, assists the socio-economic development of Rize, Erzurum and the surrounding settlements, primarily agriculture, animal husbandry and tourism.
Being located on the north-south axis connecting the provinces of Rize – Erzurum – Bingöl – Diyarbakır, this project has boosted the transportation standard of Black Sea ports with Eastern and Middle Eastern countries via Eastern Anatolia. Moreover, decreasing the travel time between İspir – 10th Region Border from 20 minutes to 10 minutes, is another positive point of this project and a total of 5,4 million TL savings will be achieved, including 2,7 million TL from time and 8,1 million TL from fuel oil, and exhaust emissions will be reduced by 554 tons annually.
