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20 July, 1998
A ground-breaking ceremony was held yesterday to mark the beginning of construction of a bridge linking the Peloponnese to mainland Greece and slash traveling time for the two million vehicles crossing the Rio-Antirrio strait each year.
Attending the ceremony in Antirrio was President of the Republic Kostis Stephanopoulos and Prime Minister Costas Simitis, as well as a number of government ministers. Speakers at the ceremony hailed the project as crucial for the development of we stern Greece. The bridge will drastically reduce traveling time, become a transport hub for all national roads and is linked with all the region's infrastructure projects.
"This is a project of major national significance," President Stephanopoulos said. "It is tangible proof of the prime minister's words that national efforts can bring major projects".
Mr. Simitis said the bridge was an example of what could be done by joint efforts and goals.
"It expresses the demands and ambitions of millions of (Greek) citizens and signals the Greece of the 21st century," he said.
Construction of the bridge by a French-Greek consortium is due to begin soon as detailed engineering and underwater drilling that commenced in October 1996 has now been completed.
Budgeted at about 230 billion drachmas, the Rio-Antirrio bridge will have two traffic lanes in each direction and one emergency lane. Its length is 2.5 kilometers and width 25 metros. Its construction will create about 1,000 new jobs.
Traffic presently crosses from the Peloponnese to mainland Greece by ferry, which is time-consuming and unreliable in adverse weather.
The bridge will eliminate the disruption and cut traveling time from 45 minutes to five minutes. More than two million vehicles cross the Rio-Antirrio strait each year.
Scheduled to open to traffic in 2004, the bridge was incorporated into the trans-European transport network in 1994. It ranks among the European Union's 14 top priority projects.
The Gefyra (Bridge) S.A. consortium won an international tender for construction and operation of the bridge, signing a contract with the state in January 1996. The project had been stalled since the 1980s.
The project is co-financed, with the state footing about 70 billion drachmas of the cost and the consortium 17 billion drachmas from its equity capital. The group is securing the remainder in the form of a loan from the European Investment Bank.
The Gefyra consortium comprises GTM International, GTM Batiments et Travaux Publics and Dyckerhoff und Widmann. Greek firms in the group are Volos Engineering Company, Elliniki Technodomiki, Proodeftiki, KI Sarantopoulos, Athina, and Joannou & Paraskevaides of Cyprus.
The consortium will operate the bridge for 42 years before handing it over to the state.
Source: Athens News Agency
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