The China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) funded Multan-Sukkur motorway is likely to be opened for traffic by August this year as work on the project is in progress according to the set schedule and there is no delay in the project, a senior official of National Highway Authority said.

“At present 83 percent of total work has been completed, out of which 392 kilometer roadbed and culvert passage, and other structures have already been completed,” the official said here on Thursday.

He said up to now, all the bridges are completed, and asphalt pavement works are advancing at full speed, and the building construction and ancillary works are also being implemented actively.

The Multan-Sukkur motorway is part of Peshawar-Karachi Motorway which is also known as the Eastern Rout of CPEC. This rout starts from Karachi via Hyderabad, Sukkur, Multan, Islamabad, Lahore and other cities, and ends in Peshawar with a total length of 1,152 kilometers.

Sukkur-Multan has a design speed of 120 km per hour, and it is a two-way six-lane road with a contractual value of USD 2.889 billion (excluding $180 million tax exemption).

The Export-Import Bank of China provides loan support and China State Construction Company Limited (CSCEC) is responsible for construction on Engineering Procurement Construction (EPC) basis. With a contract period of 36 months (including design period of four months), the project officially started on August 5, 2016.

Meanwhile Lahore-Abdul Hakeem section of M-3 would be opened for traffic by February 15. the official said that all physical work of this section had already been completed but due to some technical issues such as delay in approval for deployment of motorway police on this section, the motorway could not yet been opened.

Similarly, the officials informed that the Gojra-Shorkot section of Faisalabad-Multan motorway and 34 kilometer section of Shorkot-Dinpur section of M-4 would be opened for traffic by next month.