It took 30 years but the ring road around Belgrade is finally open for traffic!

It took 30 years but the ring road around Belgrade is finally open for traffic!

After more than 30 years of construction, the Niš-Batajnica connection via Bubanj Potok, with a total of six traffic lanes, and a length of 47 kilometers will be open today.

President Vučić will attend the opening ceremony of the ring road at 7 p.m., the Presidency announced.

The completion of the bypass around Belgrade will redirect traffic from the heavily congested main road network, which will contribute to less transit travel time, and positively affect safety on roads, reduce the costs of vehicle exploitation, minimize pollution in the city area, PUC Putevi Srbije reported.

The bypass around Belgrade connects the branch of Corridor 10b, E-75 (border with Hungary, Horgoš - Novi Sad - Belgrade) with Corridor 10, E-70 (border with Croatia, Batrovci - Belgrade), 1B state road number 26 and Route 4, E-763 "Miloš Veliki" (Belgrade - Požega - border with Montenegro Boljare) and part of Corridor 10, E-75 (Belgrade - Niš - Preševo - border with Macedonia).

Although the ring road is now connected to Corridor 10 near Bubanj Potok by highway, additional sections will soon be built. Section C from Bubanj Potok and Vinča, across the Danube, to Pančevo, in a length of 31 kilometers, to continue the traffic flow on the road ring.

Plans include the construction of a combined road-railway bridge over the Danube, between the right bank of Vinča settlement and the left bank of Starčevo settlement, and the continuation of the Beli Potok-Pančevo railway in a length of 29 kilometers.

This stretch of the road will soon see the construction of two tunnels, Bubanj Potok and Leštane, and another large profile road-railway bridge near Vinča.

Until now, vehicles from Straževica to Bubanj Potok used the section of the ring road.

Sector 6 of the Belgrade ring road consists of two lanes (full profile) of the highway from the Straževica tunnel to the Bubanj Potok interchange (including the interchange), a total of 9.74 km.

Within sector 6, both the right and left lanes of the highway have been completed, which includes the open section of the route, the Beli Potok tunnel, the Avala and Bubanj Potok interchanges, and two bridges: no. 16 and no. 17, overpassing the Avala interchange, eight bridges in the Bubanj Potok interchange, as well as four overpasses along sector 6.

When it comes to the Beli Potok tunnel, the left pipe and the right pipe are each 360 meters long.

The works were performed by the Chinese company Power China, Azvirt from Azerbaijan, and domestic subcontractors.

The main contractor was Power Construction Corporation of China Ltd, the subcontractor was Azvirt Belgrade, and the expert supervision was performed by the Construction Institute CPL d.o.o. and Maxpro d.o.o., Adomne d.o.o. and Aba-geodetska kuća d.o.o.

The consortium oversaw the second bypass lane, from the new bridge on the Sava near Ostružnica to Straževica together with the new tunnel, and both lanes to Bubanj Potok - (sectors 4.5 and 6 with a length of 20.4 km), with the contracted value totaling 325.1 million euros.

The project was financed by the Serbian budget (15%), and the remaining 85 percent was obtained from the Chinese Exim Bank.

The bypass will reduce the number of vehicles on the Gazelle Bridge, which is one of our busiest transit roads, with between 200,000 and 250,000 people, almost 130,000 vehicles, more than 7,000 light trucks, and more than 3,000 public transport vehicles crossing it daily.

In June 2022, sector B5 of the road ring around Belgrade was opened, from the interchange Orlovača to Straževica together with the new (left) Straževica tunnel.

It is a section four kilometers long, with the left highway lane with three bridges and the left tunnel tube under the Straževica hill with a length of 720 meters have been completed.

Sections of the ring road from Batajnica to Dobanovci and Ostružnica were built earlier, with a new bridge over the Sava River built next to the old Ostružnica bridge.

Plans for the construction of a road ring around Belgrade that would divert heavy freight traffic from the capital were initiated during the early 1970s.

Plans for the construction of the ring road were made at the time of the construction of the former Yugoslav highway, which was conceived as the main road of the former SFRY.

The project for the construction of a road ring around Belgrade, which was developed by the Institute for Roads, envisioned connecting Batajnica, which is located on the Novi Sad highway, Dobanovci on the Zagreb highway, Ostružnica on the Obrenovac highway, and Bubanj Potok on the Niš highway.

Even then, the plan included the connection of Leštane to Pančevo.

The construction of one lane of the priority section from Dobanovci to Bubanj Potok began in the late eighties and early nineties of the last century with the help of a loan approved by several European banks.

Due to the collapse of the federal state, war, and sanctions, the works were suspended, and then resumed.

At the end of April 1999, works were completed on the section from Dobanovci to Ostružnica.

Just before the section opened on April 29, 1999, the most important part of the route was bombed - the bridge over the Sava River near Ostružnica.

A 297-meter-long steel structure was demolished, and a 99-meter-long double-lane structure was damaged. The restoration of the bridge took more than 18 months, from July 29, 2002, to December 23, 2004.

The works continued from Ostružnica towards Orlovača, which included two major tunnels as well as the Straževica tunnel, many bridges, overpasses, underpasses, and two interchanges.

On the route from Ibarska interstate to Straževica, the most intensive works were on the construction of three large bridges, namely bridge number 13 (Kijevski potok) with a length of 555 meters, bridge number 14 (73 meters) and bridge number 15 over the Topčiderska dolina (661 meters), as well as on the route between the bridges which is 3.1 kilometers long.

At the end of 2008, the section from Ostružnica to Orlovača was opened, and in May 2012, the part of the ring road around Belgrade, from Batajnica to Dobanovci and from Orlovača to the new Straževica tunnel, was completed and opened for traffic, with a total length of 16 kilometers.

In January 2016, President Aleksandar Vučić marked the beginning of work on the construction of the second bridge over the Sava River near Ostružnica, now part of the Belgrade ring road, a twin bridge to the existing one, connection Surčin and Ostružnica interchanges.

In April 2016, the second lane of the highway on the Belgrade ring road from Dobanovci to the Ostružnica bridge was opened, and in November of the same year, a commercial contract was signed with the Chinese company Power China for the continuation of the ring road construction.

The contractor from China with its subcontractors had the task of building the left lane of this road, breaking through the second tube of the Straževica tunnel, as well as laying a six-lane highway after this facility to Bubanj Potok.

Since 2012, more than 400 kilometers of highways and expressways have been built in Serbia, and about 500 kilometers are still under construction.