On November 18 the project of the extension of the D1 motorway section Jablonov – Studenec, Stage 2 – the left carriageway, has been ceremonially commenced in the municipality of Studenec with the participation of Mr. Ján Figeľ, the minister of transport, construction and regional development. It is to be completed in 24 months, in November 2012. The section will be constructed by the consortium “Združenie Jablonov – Studenec”. The consortium leading member is the company Doprastav. Other consortium members are the companies Inžinierske stavby Košice and Váhostav – SK Žilina.

“Where there is a road, there is the life, there is the development and growth, there is the communication. It is about the people, for the people; it is with the people. I believe that also this road, this motorway, which needs to be completed, will help further development and growth not only of the municipality of Studenec, but the municipality of Spišské Podhradie, the whole Spiš region and the whole Slovakia as well,” stated Mr. Ján Figeľ, the minister of transport, construction and regional development of the SR the conviction in his speech.

Mr. Alan Sitár, the Chairman of the Board of Directors and the Director General of the company Národná diaľničná spoločnosť (National Motorway Company) assured the event attenders that all efforts shall be exerted to ensure that this Work shall be executed effectively, from the financial as well as the technology points of view, and at the same time to secure that the set deadline shall be met. This deadline is, as he also stated, set realistically, and creates sufficient space for high-quality completion of this engineering Work.   

Important infrastructure development
Mr. Dušan Šamudovský, Grad.Eng., CSc, the Member of the Board of Directors and the Director General of the company Doprastav, presented his speech on behalf of the Consortium. At the beginning of his speech he stated that during the late autumn the constructors rather used to complete and hand over the Works than to commence the new ones. But the next moment he has added that the constructors much rather tap the foundation stones, which mean that the new work is coming. “Particularly nowadays, when the Slovakian construction industry is undergoing a great crisis, we are particularly glad that this work lies in front of us and that all three companies, which are seriously stricken by the recession, have the chance to employ their own capacities within this project. It is true that considering the capacities of these three companies, it is not a large Work. It is not a Work that would fundamentally resolve the problem I described. However we do believe that it will be some kind of a turning point especially in the field of infrastructure construction and new tenders will come to the market, the possibilities to work in the field of motorways, but not only the motorways,” the Director General has stressed. As he has also added, it is a generally known fact that there are many empty places in the Slovakia’s infrastructure and it would be a mistake not to make use of the financial resources, especially the European funds, for the construction of the infrastructure as such, not only the transport infrastructure.

In the concluding part of his speech Mr. D. Šamudovský had thanked the local inhabitants for the patience with the constructors’ work during the past year and he had asked for the benevolence with the presence of construction machines for another two years. “We shall do our best to accommodate your needs and to apprehend the fact that you are living here. I hope that the good relations, which we have had here, I think, during the Stage 1, we shall maintain,” he said.

As he stated, the Consortium is ready to help the people living in the village at eventual emergency situations which have already occurred here. Only in order to put in remembrance, in 2010 the Consortium had accommodated the request of the municipality of Studenec to help at remedying the consequences due to the level III flooding activity. By timely employment of manpower and machines, substantial damages were prevented.

Few data on the Works
The subject of Stage 1 of construction of the D1 motorway section Jablonov – Studenec was the construction of the right half (carriageway) of the motorway and its opening to traffic as an expressway in the R 11.5 category. All reconstructions and relocations of the existing public utility lines were executed in the full extent, i.e. so as for the motorway in the full (dual-carriageway four lane) cross-sectional profile. The ceremonial putting in service and opening to traffic in half (single-carriageway) cross-sectional profile took place on June 7, 2010.

Within the Stage 2 it concerns the motorway’s extension into the full, D 26.5 cross-sectional profile and putting the four-lane highway in service. The extension concerns the left carriageway with the overall length of 5,210 metres in cadastres of municipalities of Spišské Podhradie, Jablonov and Studenec. The number of structures is 16, when the motorway structure with the length of 5.21 kilometres, four motorway bridges with the total length of 900 metres and two noise barriers, 260 m and 800 m long, belong among the most important ones. Extensive reconstructions of the existing roads are part of the Works as well.

Compared to Stage 1 there is a change in the construction duration. Instead of 14 months till putting the road in service in Stage 1 there are 24 months available in Stage 2, which enables above all more cost effective construction of motorway embankment.

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