Attiki Odos: a new urban tunnel to connect Attica Ring Road with the national road is in the pipeline

The extensions of Attiki Odos have come up again in the last months and this time everything shows that we will be able to see them implemented. The most mature of these is the extension of Kymi Avenue to the National Road. The most important news that comes out of this important expansion is that it will be done with an “urban” tunnel. According to information from ypodomes.com, the total length of the extension of Kymi Avenue will be about 4 kilometers, most of which are an urban tunnel of about 3 kilometers that will pass under the northern suburbs of Athens. More specifically, it will pass under Pefki and Lykovrisi.

According to studies that have been prepared, the transportation model shows that until 2027 there will be road congestion points in the wider metropolitan area of Attica, including large sections of the two main highways of Kifissos Avenue (A1 and A8) and Attiki Odos). An important intervention is the extension of Kymi Avenue to Kifissos which will alleviate the traffic jam at the exit with Attiki Odos.

Today, as ypodomes.com is informed, the maturation of the project is in the final stage and the next steto update the land registry for the necessary expropriations (in the department within the city). There is also the preparation of some final studies that will be completed in the first half of 2021.It is estimated that in 2021 (the optimistic forecasts forsee the summer of 2021) the project will be able to be announced.

Its cost has been estimated at around 250 million euros (excluding VAT) and its financing will be sought from the Recovery Fund. It is one of the projects that is considered to easily gain the approval of the EU. The project is expected to be the “fighting point” between the country’s major technical groups.

The “resurrection” of the extensions of Attiki Odos

The extension of L. Kymi, which is part of the 3 extensions of Attiki Odos, is one of the projects that the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport included in the list of projects to be financed by the Recovery and Sustainability Plan presented yesterday by the Greek government.

The goal of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport is for the project to be completed by the end of 2026, which is the time point set for the projects funded by the Recovery Fund. The projects for the extensions of Attiki Odos were announced last September by the Minister of Infrastructure and Transport, Costas Karamanlis, and since then leaps have been made to promote them for implementation, with the extension of Kimi Avenue preceding.

Two months ago, the Mayor of Maroussi, Theodoros Abazoglou, through his Municipal Council, stated that in addition to the expansion project of L. Kymi, the Municipality will also claim the undergrounding of a section of Kifissia Avenue, a project that in his opinion will “unite” Maroussi which is currently separated from Kifissias Avenue and which will significantly improve the traffic load in the Northern Suburbs.

In the extensions of Attiki Odos, another urban tunnel has been selected, which will connect Katehaki and Vouliagmeni Avenue with a parallel upgrade of the avenue to Elliniko. Finally, an extension to the port of Rafina is planned and at the same time the extension of the suburban railway to the second largest ferry port of Attica is planned.