Speaking during a visit to a construction site in the east of the country, Andrzej Adamczyk said that more than 2,400 projects were in progress throughout the country to build and modernise roads, helping save some 1.5 million jobs amid the COVID-19 crisis.
“We're on a site where work is in full swing,” Adamczyk said at a press conference in the town of Janów Lubelski.
He added: “And that’s exactly what’s happening at all construction sites in the country. We have not stopped construction projects. The coronavirus has not halted road building in Poland.”
Adamczyk at the weekend visited the construction site of a seven-kilometre stretch of road known as the Janów Lubelski Beltway, which is being built in eastern Poland as part of Expressway S19 at a cost of PLN 148.5 million (EUR 33.4 million, USD 37.6 million), state news agency PAP reported.
Polish Infrastructure Minister Andrzej Adamczyk. Photo: PAP/Wojtek Jargiło
Adamczyk told reporters on Saturday that a trans-European transport route known as Via Carpathia would be completed by the end of 2025.
The Via Carpathia would run from the Lithuanian cities of Klaipeda and Kaunas via Poland’s Białystok, Lublin and Rzeszów to Košice in Slovakia and Debrecen in Hungary and further on to Romania, Bulgaria and Greece.
The route would stretch all the way to the Romanian port of Constanţa on the Black Sea and Salonika in Greece on the Aegean Sea, according to officials.
Polish President Andrzej Duda, who is seeking reelection for a second five-year term, said at the end of last month that large infrastructure and industrial projects were a driver of economic growth in the time of the coronavirus crisis.
The Polish president and prime minister in late May urged stepped-up investment in Europe to stimulate economies and help them recover from the coronavirus pandemic.
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Source: PAP