Over 70 percent work of Rs eight billion Lowari Tunnel project on Nowshera-Dir-Chitral Road (N-45) has been completed and the project would be completed by next year, a source in National Highway Authority (NHA) told APP on Saturday.
He said that over 75 percent work of 9 kilometres each access road on both sides of the tunnel has also been completed. The 8.6 km-long rail tunnel will provide all-weather communication linkage to the Chitral Valley, which remains cut-off with other parts of the country in winter. It would also facilitate Pakistan's link with landlocked Central Asian state of Tajikistan via a narrow strip of Afghanistan. With its completion, distance between Peshawar and Chitral would be reduced to five or six hours from 12 or 14 hours, he added.
Work on the project started in 2005 and it was formally inaugurated by former President Pervez Musharraf in July 2006. A Korean firm is constructing around 9 kilometres long, 7.5 metre wide and 7 metre high tunnel. The source said that the project would be completed in two phases. In the first phase tunnel would be constructed while in the second phase a railway track would be laid, he added. He said it would be the biggest freight tunnel in Asia, adding that the project is a joint venture between Korean firm Sambu and some Pakistani firms.
It was more than 45 years back when first feasibility was taken up by the government in 1955 and the first construction was undertaken under the Frontier Works Organisation in 1975 during Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's regime. The FWO carried out tunnelling operation up to 500 meters but the then ruler President Ziaul Haq abandoned the project.
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