Vietnam’s railway plan to come with hefty price tag

Vietnam’s proposal to build a $56bn high-speed railway from Hanoi to HCM City may be more than the country can afford, economists and National Assembly deputies said yesterday.

The government submitted its plan for the railway, to be built with Japanese technical assistance, to the National Assembly on Thursday.

The railway would stretch 1,570 kilometres and cut the travel time between Hanoi and HCM City from at least 36 hours today to under 10 hours. Foreign development assistance and loans from the World Bank would be needed to finance the project. Critics say the debt would be too large to recoup at realistic ticket prices in a low- to middle-income country like Vietnam.

Tags: Vietnam Infrastructure, Vietnam high-speed railway, Vietnam transport

Posted by VBN on May 24 2010. Filed under Infrastructure. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry