Hanoi is organizing urgent construction, working day and night to handle the traffic congestion point that has lasted for many years at the Northwest gateway of the Capital, near Noi Bai International Airport.
The area of the National Highway 2 intersection - access road to the Noi Bai - Lao Cai expressway has long been considered a traffic "black spot", especially in the direction from Vo Van Kiet street to the expressway. For many years, this area has often fallen into a state of overload and prolonged congestion.
The main reason is that this is an important traffic axis connecting Hanoi with the Northwest provinces and Lao Cai International Border Gate. The traffic volume through the intersection is constantly increasing, at times congestion stretches for kilometers, and trucks line up and rush back towards Noi Bai airport.
Meanwhile, the road cross-section in the area intersecting with the expressway is still limited. On weekends, holidays, and Tet, the number of vehicles increases sharply, causing the area to be frequently overloaded, with cars tailing each other, congested for hours.
Faced with the above situation, the Hanoi People's Committee issued an order to build an emergency project, focusing on improving infrastructure and reorganizing traffic at this intersection.
The project is assigned by the Hanoi Department of Construction to the Traffic Infrastructure Maintenance Board as the representative of the investor. The contractor consortium includes Hanoi Traffic Works Company 2 and Ha Thanh Consulting and Construction Joint Stock Company to implement, with the goal of completion in March 2026.
According to Mr. Nguyen Viet Cuong, official of the Maintenance Supervision Department (Management Board of Transport Infrastructure Works), the renovation project includes 4 main routes. Route 1 is more than 507m long, from Vo Van Kiet street to the traffic light intersection to the expressway; route 2 is nearly 450m long, from the access road intersection to the expressway to the expressway exit intersection. These two routes have the median strip cut to widen the road surface.
After adjustment, the direction from Vo Van Kiet - National Highway 2 - traffic light intersection to the expressway is expanded from 3 to 5 lanes; the direction from the expressway to Vo Van Kiet street is increased from 3 to 4 lanes.
Route 3, the access road to the expressway is about 250m long, expanded from 2 to 3 lanes. Route 4, the section from the expressway to the outside is about 300m long, the road surface is expanded from about 6m to nearly 9m, meeting the conditions to organize 2 lanes. The project also adds a synchronous lighting system throughout the area.
Right before the Lunar New Year, contractors urgently expanded the temporary road surface on the right side of route 1, widening it by about 4-5m; the median strip previously planted with green trees was removed to add lanes on National Highway 2. The section connecting National Highway 2 to the expressway was temporarily expanded to 3 lanes; in the direction from the expressway outwards, the road cross-section was also adjusted from 6m to nearly 9m to increase vehicle exit capacity.
Representatives of the construction unit said that if the weather is favorable, the project can be completed in March 2026. "Thanks to widening the road surface and reorganizing traffic, during the peak period from the 5th to the 6th day of Tet - the time when people from the Northwest provinces return to Hanoi - traffic volume increased but no longer experienced prolonged congestion as before," said Mr. Nguyen Viet Cuong.
