Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev signed a decree on August 30 approving updated plans to build the country’s first public-private partnership (PPP) toll roads.
Tashkent-Samarkand
A tender for the construction of the Tashkent-Samarkand toll road should be announced this month. A contractor is expected to be selected and a contract signed in December, with construction work expected to begin shortly thereafter.
The project is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2028. After that, the road should be transferred to a private operator under a PPP contract. The preliminary cost of the project is estimated at 2.2 billion dollars.
Tashkent-Andijan
The construction of the 303-kilometer-long Tashkent-Andijan toll road will be supported by the World Bank. The estimated cost of this project is $4.28 billion. But in May, Deputy Transport Minister Jasurbek Chorijev said it could reach $4.6 billion.
Approval of the project concept is scheduled for October. The first phase of the tender procedure is set for March 2025 and the second for October. The winner of the tender should be announced in April 2026, the PPP contract should be signed in the same month.
Other projects
Another project included in the program is the construction of a toll road between 1 billion dollars Samarkand and Bukhara in the years 2027-2030.
AND toll tunnel is planned to be built on Up to the plate mountain pass. Negotiations with potential strategic companies should take place by the end of the year. The project concept should be approved by August 2025.
A private partner is expected to be selected by February 2026 and a PPP agreement signed by December 2026. The cost of the project is estimated at USD 100 million. The tunnel will be 4.4 kilometers long. In October 2023, President Mirziyoyev said that construction of the tunnel would begin in 2024.
New ring road in Chirchik, The Tashkent region (connecting roads 4P5 and 4K755A) with an asphalt concrete pavement is to be built by the end of 2025 at a cost of $60 million.
Section 49 km (from the 3rd to the 52nd km). A378-Karshi Highway in the Samarkand-Karshi direction will be reconstructed with a cement-concrete road with an estimated cost of 75 million USD. This project is to be completed by the end of 2028.
Delayed projects
The development of toll roads within the framework of PPP agreements has been planned since 2018, when the Cabinet of Ministers issued a decree that planned the gradual introduction of these roads from January 1, 2020.
However, a year later, Transport Minister Elyor Ganiyev said that the construction of the Tashkent-Samarkand toll road was delayed due to the high tariffs proposed by the investor.
In March 2021, it was announced that the tariffs for passenger cars traveling on the planned Tashkent-Samarkand and Tashkent-Andijan toll roads will be US$5–6. The maximum speed on these roads was expected to be 120-150 km/h.
In 2021, it was announced that the cost of construction of the Tashkent-Andijan highway will exceed $2 billion. World Bank representatives then estimated that cars using the road would be charged between $5 and $7, while trucks and buses could pay up to $15.
