BOU SALEM - Frontière Algérienne | Highway | 80 Km | Project

[Gadiri]

The “Completion of the Central Section of the Trans-Maghreb Motorway Axis

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This project will provide a continuous motorway corridor from Agadir, Morocco to Ras Ajdir, Libya that will improve regional integration and socio-economic development by facilitating trade relations and the mobility of the population of the region.

The completion of the missing links in Morocco and Tunisia to connect the central section of the trans-Maghreb motorway axis, namely the Algerian, Moroccan and Tunisian national motorway networks, will provide a continuous motorway corridor from Agadir, Morocco to Ras Ajdir, Libya that will improve regional integration and socio-economic development by facilitating trade relations and the mobility of the population of the region.


During the UfM Senior Officials meeting held in Brussels on 10th February 2012, the UfM member States adopted the Completion of the Central Section of Maghreb Motorway Axis Project. The project proposal presented by CETMO, the Technical Secretariat of the Group of Transport Ministers of the Western Mediterranean (GTMO 5+5), aims to complete the missing links of the Central Section of the Trans-Maghreb Motorway Axis thus linking the Algerian, Moroccan and Tunisian national motorway networks to provide a continuous motorway corridor from Agadir (Morocco) to Ras Jedir (Tunisian-Libyan border).

The sections to be completed by the construction of a dual carriageway motorway with at least two lanes running parallel to the Maghreb coast are Oujda (Morocco) - Algerian border (22 Km), and Bou Salem (Tunisia) - Algerian border (80 Km).

In conjunction with the completion of the infrastructure in progress, the Central Maghreb countries are willing to work together in a coordinated manner within the existing consultation frameworks, such as the GTMO 5+5 and the Arab Maghreb Union (AMU), for the success of coordinated management of the axis and to give it complete interoperability and a high quality service that shares the same standards all along the axis.

The project will enhance regional integration and socio-economic development by facilitating mobility of the population of the region, trade and business opportunities. It will improve transport conditions, reducing travel times and the number of accidents, and it is foreseen that a high percentage of the population of these three countries will benefit from this connection.

The project will, on the other hand, strengthen the trans-Maghreb motorway axis for it is part of the Trans-Mediterranean Transport Network (TMN-T) and a major Maghreb road corridor, and consequently, is of strategic importance to the Euro-Mediterranean region.

The importance of the trans-Maghreb motorway has been recognized in various international platforms. In 1990 the AMU defined the Motorway for the Maghreb Union as a project of paramount importance for the region. In the MOU signed in 2008 between the AMU and the Group of Transport Ministers of Western Mediterranean (GTMO 5+5), the two organizations undertook to promote the completion of this motorway. In 2009 at the sixth GTMO 5+5 Ministerial Conference a decision was made to intensify efforts to complete the missing links in the motorway.

It is also worth pointing out that the project falls within the priority areas of the UfM Secretariat, namely the creation of coastal motorways, as identified by the Heads of State and Government in the Paris Declaration, and those covered by the Secretariat's Work Program. The project proposal not only has strong co-ownership by the involvement of three governments namely Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia, where the project will be implemented, it also foresees both public and private sector participation.

With the realization of this project the motorway interconnection between the three countries of Maghreb namely Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia will be complete and the project's outcome will have a multiplying effect for the rest of the Mediterranean region and for Europe as a whole, enabling increased mobility among the population and facilitating international freight flows.

http://www.ufmsecretariat.org/en/com...egional-trade/