VietNamNet Bridge – Trillions of dong have been poured into the ports in HCM City. However, the ports still cannot operate in full swing because there are no roads linking to the ports.

The Phu Huu Port

Port developers, businesses wait for roads to be built

Located in the Hiep Phuoc Port Urban Area, the Saigon – Hiep Phuoc port has been built to replace the Saigon port, which is getting overloaded, and connect with the other big ports in the city.

However, to date, the port still cannot serve as expected because the roads linking to the port are not ready yet.

According to Nguyen Hoang Dung, General Director of the Saigon Hiep Phuoc Port Company, some basic items of the port have been completed, including the pier No. 3 with the length of 200 meters and costs VND1.05 trillion.

However, since there is no road to the port, the pier still cannot be used, while the other modern equipment have been left idle. A temporary float has been installed in the middle of Long Tau River to serve the rice transportation.

All the roads linking to the Saigon Hiep Phuoc port are still under construction. The north-south route linking Nguyen Van Linh road and the port complex is still awaiting capital to be upgraded. The 2.3 kilometer D3 route linking Ba Chiem and Hiep Phuoc has got stuck because of the problems in site clearance.

Meanwhile, Nguyen Van Tao road, the only way that links Nguyen Van Linh road and Hiep Phuoc Industrial Zone has seriously degraded. The situation is believed to be even more serious in the time to come, when the industrial zone is full of enterprises (there are now 100 operational enterprises there) and more container vehicles roll on the road every day.

It is expected that the two harbors with the total capacity of 1.5 million TEU would be put into operation by 2014. This means the increase in the cargo flow on the road

Dung complained that since there is no road linking to the Saigon Hiep Phuoc port, the investor has to carry building materials to the construction site on barges, which pushes up the investment costs.

The Phu Huu Port in district 9, becoming operational since July 2010, has been running at 40 percent of capacity only. The problem is that the stretch of road linking Nguyen Duy Trinh road and Phu Huu port, about two kilometers, has not been built. The construction has been at a standstill over the last three years because of the problems in site clearance.

According to Nguyen Ngoc Thao, General Director of Cang Ben Nghe Company Ltd, the developer of Phu Huu, said the only way to save Phu Huu is to upgrade and expand Nguyen Duy Trinh road.

However, Thao admitted that it would be not easy to arrange hundreds of billions of dong for the road upgrading project.

Still looking for capital

Bui Xuan Cuong, Deputy Director of the HCM City Transport Department, when asked about the roads, explained that the city’s budget still cannot arrange money for the road projects.

HCM City every year needs VND50 trillion to develop the transport infrastructure, but the city’s budget can only provide 10 percent of this amount. Meanwhile, it is very difficult to call for capital from different sources.

The project on the belt road No. 3, for example, has not advanced over the last many years, despite the city’s great efforts to call for investments.

DDDN