HCMC proposes $124 mln in state funding for Moc Bai expressway

Vietnam's southern economic hub Ho Chi Minh City has asked the government to allocate VND2.9 trillion ($124 million) for the construction of a 50-kilometer expressway linking it with neighboring Tay Ninh province next to Cambodia.

In its proposal to the Prime Minister, the HCMC People’s Committee said the sum will be allocated to the two localities to aid site clearance, which will cost an estimated VND7.4 trillion ($315.4 million), or 44% of the project’s total investment.

The city's administration also proposed the PM partially adjust the route of the HCMC-Moc Bai Expressway at the request of the Ministry of Defense, so as not to affect military land in Cu Chi district.

The VND16.7 trillion ($712 million) project will be implemented under a public-private partnership (PPP). The expressway is designed to have four lanes in the first phase and then 6-8 lanes, allowing a speed limit of 120 km per hour.

According to the people's committee, work on the route is expected to start this year and be basically completed in 2026.

Upon completion in 2027, it will ease traffic pressure on existing National Highway 22 that runs from HCMC to Vietnam’s Moc Bai border gate in Tay Ninh province; and connect Cambodia’s Bavet border gate in Svay Rieng province.

The expressway will also promote socio-economic development in Vietnam’s Southern Key Economic Zone, of which HCMC is a part. National Highway 22 is also the Vietnamese section of Asian Highway 1 (AH1), the longest in the Asian Highway Network, with a total length of 20,557 km.

As planned, the HCMC and Tay Ninh sections of the new expressway will be 23.7 km and 26.3 km long, respectively.

In September 2022, the U.S.-based PHI Group said it had been allowed to register to invest in constructing the HCMC-Moc Bai Expressway project.