Top priorities: Murmansk infrastructure and Sochi Olympic Games
The development of the Murmansk Transport Hub is just as important for Russia as the Sochi Olympic Games, Governor Dmitry Dmitriyenko argues. The implementation of the infrastructure plans are due to start after 2010.
In this week’s meeting with federal Transport Minister Igor Levitin, Governor Dmitriyenko highlighted the vital role of the Murmansk Transport Hub, comparing its importance with the upcoming 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi as well as the Asian-Pacific Economic Cooperation, Regnum reports.
Minister Levitin was in Murmansk to attend a meeting on the development of the transport hub, a process which Levitin himself is leading. In the meeting, the outer borders of the Murmansk Sea Port were agreed upon, something will take the port development plans an important step closer implementation. The port areas will stretch over to the western side of the Kola Bay where both a new railway line and several industrial facilities are planned.
The projecting phase of the grand infrastructure plans will continue to 2010, when the construction of infrastructure objects can start, the minister confirmed. A total of 750 million RUB of federal money is earmarked the project phase.
As reported earlier by BarentsObserver, however, Mr. Levitin recently admitted that the development of the transport hub is being delayed if compared with the development of the huge Shtokman gas field in the Barents Sea.
The Murmansk Transport Hub will be vital for the oil and gas industry in the region, which is in dire need of additional port, service and infrastructure facilities. Gazprom and its partners in the Shtokman Development Company plan to have the Shtokman field in production from year 2013.
With him to Murmansk, Minister Levitin also brought promises of 2,5 billion RUB of extra infrastructure development money, half of which will be spent on the upgrade of the highway linking Murmansk with Sankt Petersburg.
The stakeholders in the Murmansk Transport Hub are the Murmansk the Murmansk Commercial Sea Port (40%), Russian Railways (25%), Rosneft (15%), the federal Russian Sea Port Agency (15%) and the Murmansk regional administration (5%).
