From Armenia in brief: Two Armenian presidents participate in road opening

by Maria Titizian

Published: Saturday December 06, 2008

A view of the new 2.5-kilometer Getar expressway in Yerevan, inaugurated on December 3, 2008. Photolure

Yerevan - Former President Robert Kocharian and President Serge Sargsian participated at the opening of the new 2.5 kilometer Getar expressway in Yerevan on December 3.  The expressway, which has five multilevel overpasses and three underground and overground pedestrian crosswalks, will help ease congestion and allow unhampered transportation on 10 key streets of the city and significantly reduce travel time from one end of Yerevan to the other. The major part of the road section will pass on the Getar river, which now flows underground. Moreover, all three bridges that crossed the river in the center of the capital were also replaced.

According to Arminfo, the total cost of the project was 8.5 billion AMD (about $28 million today) and the work on the modification of the Getar river was about 5.4 billion AMD. State funds were allocated for the public works, and construction was carried out by the Design Institute Yerevanproject, Griar Company and Araratshin OJSC.

Also taking part in the opening ceremonies was Yerevan Mayor Yervand Zakharyan, who said: "In fact, now we have an alternative route of joining the northern and southern regions of the capital. It means that the life  of Yerevan residents will become much more comfortable. I would like to express  my gratitude  to the incumbent and the previous authorities of Armenia for their contribution to development and construction  of these important projects."