People expect
The project of connecting Provincial Road 151 (Vo Lao, Van Ban) with Noi Bai - Lao Cai Expressway was approved by Lao Cai Provincial People's Committee on November 8, 2021 with a total investment of 115 billion VND, with Van Ban District People's Committee as the investor.
The total length of the route is more than 12km, the starting point of the route intersects with Provincial Road 151 at Km21+580, the end point is at the residential underpass of Noi Bai - Lao Cai Expressway at Km217+980 in Cam Con Commune, Bao Yen District. The completed project will form a traffic connection axis from Vo Lao to Sa Pa Airport.
Construction started in August 2023 and is expected to be completed and put into use by 2024.
On September 23, according to the reporter of Lao Dong Newspaper, although it has been more than 1 year of construction and only about 3 months left until the scheduled completion, in reality, the road is still unfinished and messy. People's travel is difficult due to the muddy road after the rain.
Ms. Nguyen Thi Manh (residing in Bat 2 village, Vo Lao commune, Van Ban district) said: “The area where we live has been marked with planning markers to build a road connecting to Cam Con commune, Bao Yen district. However, currently, construction is only in the inner area and has not reached the outside, so people have not moved yet.”
According to Ms. Manh, the people in the commune are very excited because the government has invested in building large and beautiful roads to make travel more convenient. Not only is the road connecting to Bao Yen under construction, but Provincial Road 151 running along Vo Lao commune is also being speeded up to complete, renovate and upgrade.
According to information from the Van Ban District Construction Investment Project Management Board, up to now, the implementation process has only reached 35% of the contract value.
The functional units have completed the statistics and inventory of the current status of land recovery for 156 households in Vo Lao commune (Van Ban) and Cam Con commune (Bao Yen); issued decisions to recover land for 104 households and completed the records and procedures for land recovery for the remaining households in the two communes.
The construction unit has excavated the roadbed from Km1+00 to Km7+00, constructed horizontal drainage culverts, curb embankments from Km3+00 to Km7+00 and underground spillway at Km1+121.
Cannot be completed by the end of the year
According to the Van Ban District Construction Investment Project Management Board, the current difficulty is that during the project implementation from Km4+00 to Km5+400, a length of 1.4km in Xuan Tien village, Vo Lao commune, iron ore was discovered.
On June 27, 2023, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment issued a document on the collection, management and protection of minerals when implementing the project.
In addition, there is a large bridge over Ngoi Nhu stream on the route, planned to go over the Vo Lao hydroelectric dam. However, Vo Lao hydroelectric plant currently has no investment policy. Therefore, when the route is completed, it will not be open to traffic because there is no bridge over the stream.
Regarding this, Chairman of the People's Committee of Vo Lao Commune, Tran Anh Tan, said: "The issue of discovering iron ore during road construction has been reviewed and resolved by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment. We only coordinate to control the gathering and prevent transportation out of the locality. As for when the road will be completed, we do not know."
"Basically, people in the commune support the road construction, but due to the mechanism, there are about 5 more households in the process of being resolved," informed Chairman of the People's Committee of Vo Lao commune.
On September 26, Mr. Pham Van Cuong - Director of the Van Ban District Construction Investment Project Management Board confirmed that the construction of the road connecting Provincial Road 151 with the Noi Bai - Lao Cai Expressway was stopped for about 7 months and could not be completed as planned by the end of the year.
The reason is that iron ore was discovered during the implementation process, so the project had to stop and wait for a treatment plan from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment.
"We know there is ore, but the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment has issued a document on mineral gathering, so the unit does not break the route but continues to implement construction in parallel with the collection to the yard.
"How to use the ore is another party's business. At the same time, because we have to wait for a treatment plan, we are asking for an extension to complete the project to make up for the waiting time," said Mr. Cuong.
According to the Director of the Van Ban District Construction Investment Project Management Board, the section running through the Vo Lao hydropower plant has been agreed not to invest but to use the dam surface as a road.
