Contract was signed with winner of international tender announced for construction of 13 km long Kvesheti-Kobi road. New road will be constructed by “China Railway 23rd Bureau Group Co. Ltd”. Contract for construction of 13 km long road section is signed by Mr. Aleksandre Tevdoradze, Deputy Chairman of Roads Department and Mr. Yang Youbin, General Manager of Constant Department (Branch) of China Railway 23rd Bureau Group Co. Ltd.

China Railway 23rd Bureau Group Co. Ltd was established in 2002, is affiliated to China Railway Construction Corporation Limited, which is one of the super-large state-owned enterprises supervised by the Sate-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council and is recognized as the world’s largest construction company. Company have completed construction of bridges with total length of 410 km, and  tunnels with total length of 610.1 km within the recent years. Company was engaged in construction of 153 highways and realized more than 1200 highway projects. Annual construction capacity exceeds 20,000,000 m³.

Construction of Kvesheti-Kobi road is divided into two sections. The project envisages construction of 22.7 km 2-lane asphalt-concrete road, 6 bridges and 5 tunnels, including arch bridge and one 9 km long tunnel.    Width of 9km long tunnel will be 15 meters, which is quite rare not only in Transcaucasia, but also worldwide. In this regard, Kvesheti-Kobi tunnel will enter the list of tunnels with largest diameters.

Kvesheti-Kobi section is a part of North-South transit corridor. The road passes through difficult terrain and is characterized with heavy snowfalls in winter period.    New road and 9km long tunnel will solve existing problems and consequently will ensure free transit traffic at any time of the year.    The tunnel will ensure safe and more reliable conditions for road users during the winter. Besides, new road will prevent Kazbegi national park and Gudauri winter resort from traffic flows.

The road will also improve living conditions of population remained in the gorge, which are isolated from the outside world in winter period and other infrastructure projects implemented or planned in Kazbegi Municipality will promote to return migration to gorge, create new tourist trails  and revival of economic growth.

Nine villages fell under the impact of the project.