UPDATE - Turkey to hold tender for Grand Istanbul Tunnel in 2020

UPDATE WITH MORE DETAILS FROM MINISTER'S SPEECH

By Goksel Yildirim, Ayse Bocuoglu Bodur, and Arife Yildiz Unal

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey is planning a tender this year for a third underwater tunnel beneath Istanbul’s Bosphorus Strait, this one combining both road and railway passages, officials announced Tuesday.

The Grand Istanbul Tunnel contract will have the build-operate-transfer (BOT) model, said Cahit Turhan, Turkey’s transportation and infrastructure minister.

The three-level mega-project will integrate with the Yenikapi-Sefakoy subway line, he told an annual meeting in the capital Ankara.

After completion, the tunnel is set to be used by some 6.5 million people annually to travel between the Asian and European sides of Istanbul.

The 6.5-kilometer (4 mile) tunnel, which will include a rail system and highways together under the Bosphorus, aims to reduce traffic in the metropolis and save time.

The healthy operation of trade and transportation is indispensable for Turkey’s development, Turhan underlined.

The new tunnel is set to join the Eurasia Tunnel, a 5.4 km (3.4 mi) highway-only passage which opened in 2016, and the Marmaray, a 13.5-km (8.4 mi) commuter rail and train passage which opened in 2013, both beneath the Bosphorus.

- Project updates

Touching on a bridge now being built across the Canakkale Strait, northwest of the Bosporus into the Sea of Marmara, he stressed that construction of the 1915 Canakkale Bridge is ongoing.

Saying that public-private partnership investments in Turkey now total 776.6 billion Turkish liras ($313.14 billion), he added that motorways make up a major part of these investments.

"Seventy-seven Turkish provinces are connected to each other via divided roads with a total length reaching 27,181 km [16,889 mi]," he underlined.

He added these divided roads provide savings of 18.1 billion Turkish liras ($3 billion) annually by shortening travel time and reducing fuel consumption.

On the new mega Istanbul Airport, Turhan said since it opened last October, it saw 330,574 aircraft and 55 million passengers.

Turhan highlighted that the number of airports in Turkey more than doubled from 26 in 2003 to 56 now.

Turkey is preparing to launch indigenous satellites – Turksat 5A and Turksat 5B – in 2020 and 2021, he added.

* Writing and contributions by Gokhan Ergocun from Istanbul