The approved layout of the Shchelkovskoye Highway backup will not affect Losiny Island

Rosavtodor has completed the process of “investment justification” for the construction of one of the most complex road construction projects near Moscow – the future backup of Shchelkovskoye Highway, the project of which has been discussed for more than 10 years. The layout of the eight-lane highway has already been developed: the road will pass north of Entuziastov Highway along the edge of Balashikha, bypassing the Losiny Ostrov National Park. According to Kommersant, the project will require 208 billion rubles; There are no funds allocated for this in the federal budget. In this regard, a scenario for attracting private investment is being discussed – in this case, travel on the road will become tolled.

The layout of the Shchelkovskoe highway backup, approved by the order of Rosavtodor, was published on the website of the Balashikha administration. “Kommersant” studied the document. The 24-kilometer route will start from the MKAD-Entuziastov highway interchange, then pass south of the existing Shchelkovskoye highway, then through the Gorensky forest park, along the edge of Balashikha, through the Ozerny forest park, past the villages of Almazovo, Bolshie Zherebtsy, and again join the A-103. It will be an eight-lane highway (four lanes in each direction), with six interchanges and five crossings.

The project to build a backup has been discussed for more than ten years. During this time, five options were considered, including reconstruction of the existing highway and laying a backup route through the territory of the Losiny Ostrov federal national park. There has been a long debate between environmentalists, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Rosavtodor about how the highway should go and which option will cause the least damage to nature. In 2019–2023, Rosavtodor carried out an “investment feasibility study” of all scenarios, during which engineering, geodetic and environmental surveys were undertaken. In March 2023, the company decided on the route, but the route appeared only now. The investment justification process has been completed, Rosavtodor confirmed to Kommersant yesterday, the road in the current project “will practically not affect built-up areas” and will not affect the territory of Losiny Ostrov. A package of necessary documents has been sent to the Federal Autonomous Institution “Glavgosexpertiza of Russia”, where a technical and price audit must be carried out.

Meanwhile, the issue of financing the construction is still up in the air. All major federal road facilities, let us remind you, are described in the government’s five-year plan for 2024–2028—there is no backup for the Shchelkovsky Highway there. “Volumes and sources of financing,” Rosavtodor said, will be determined after the audit is completed. In January 2024, according to Kommersant, the government of the Moscow region, interested in reducing traffic congestion in the northeastern direction, contacted the Ministry of Transport of the Russian Federation with a request to transfer the finished documentation for the backup to the region. The Moscow region authorities were ready to build the route with the involvement of a concessionaire. In this case, the project, the preliminary estimate of which is estimated at 208 billion rubles, will be financed, including from extra-budgetary sources. This means that travel will be paid. Earlier, as Kommersant reported, the transfer of the project to the state company Avtodor for the same purpose was discussed, but this scenario was abandoned. The reaction of the Ministry of Transport to the letter from regional officials is still unknown.

“The need to create a backup arose a couple of ten years ago. The existing four-lane Shchelkovskoe highway has long exhausted its capacity, while the demand for travel in this direction is growing, and the territories continue to be built up,” says Andrey Mukhortikov, a member of the public council at the regional Ministry of Transport. “Reconstruction of the Shchelkovskoe highway outside the Moscow Ring Road is essentially impossible – it would be necessary to buy out hundreds of land plots.” plots on which houses stand.” The “northern” version of the backup along the edge of “Losiny Island” (discussed earlier) was, according to Mr. Mukhortikov, more “optimal”: “The volume of deforestation there was less than in the one chosen now, especially since the region was ready to compensate for this forest by annexing new territories to the national park.” The volume of planned felling is unknown.

The regional Ministry of Transport tried to discuss the chosen highway route with environmentalists, but the matter did not progress beyond the first meeting, Anton Khlynov, a member of the expert council at Rosleskhoz, told Kommersant. “The project needed to be discussed in more detail. There is enough finance in the region to choose not the most economically profitable one for the sake of greening,” the expert is sure. Mr. Khlynov supports the decision not to build a road through Losiny Ostrov, but points out that the proposed route leads to fragmentation of forest areas, which are quite valuable for the Moscow region not only from an environmental, but also from a historical and archaeological point of view. “This option cannot be called the best possible, but it is dictated by the development policy; people need this backup,” the ecologist argues. “If we listened to the opinion of the scientific community, we would advocate more expensive, but gentle options using engineering means, tunnels , without harming the landscape.”

Ivan Buranov, Polina Yachmennikova