All vessels
will be prohibited on a section of the Saigon River for two days as the first
section of a 1.5 kilometer-tunnel is built in Ho Chi Minh City this weekend.
Under the
latest announcement by the Ho Chi Minh City Port Authority, ships and other
vehicles won't be allowed on the river between Binh Khanh T intersection of the
Soai Rap and Nha Be rivers and the My Canh Area on the Saigon River from 6 a.m.
to 12 a.m. on Saturday.
The
suspension, however, won't take effect on the whole section at the same time but
will depend on the location of the convoy transporting the Thu Thiem Tunnel
section, according to the announcement.
The port
authorities planned to stop all the vehicles at the My Canh Area and Nha Rong
port from 12 a.m. on Saturday to 12 p.m. on Sunday when the 27,000-ton section
was put in place after moving for 22 kilometers from the adjacent province of
Dong Nai.
This would
cause certain difficulties to ships in moving into and out of seaports like
Saigon, Tan Thuan and Vietnam International Container Terminals, Ho Kim Lan,
general secretary of Vietnam Seaports Association, was quoted by local newswire
Thoi Bao Kinh Te Saigon Online as saying.
However, as
the Thu Thiem Tunnel was a significant project, each port should discuss and
cooperate with the city's port authorities to adjust ships' movements to prevent
losses, Lan said.
Vuong Hoang
Thanh, vice director of the East West Highway and Water Environment Project,
which includes construction of the tunnel, said the second section was slated to
be put in place next month, according to the news source.
All four
sections of the tunnel, which is expected to be Southeast Asia's longest, would
be in place by the end of August, the official added.
Linking
HCMC's District 1 and 2, the tunnel is slated to open to traffic next year.
It was
first expected to be completed at the end of 2008, but later delayed when
authorities found cracks in the sections that were still under construction at a
site in Dong Nai province in June the same year. The repairs weren't finished
until this January.