Paul Goble
Staunton, April 21 – The Association of Infrastructure Investors and Creditors is urging Moscow to build toll roads between the Russian Far East and the rest of the country even when there are no free alternatives. Some Russians see these separating that region from Europe, and Sergey Mironov, head of the Just Russia Party, promises protests.
According to the party leader, if the Russian government agrees to build such toll roads without free alternatives, that will contribution to the disintegration of Russia because large parts of the country will be able to reach others only if they pay tolls, something few will want to do (iarex.ru/news/153175.html).
Russia has long been underserved by highways especially in the north and to the east of the Urals; and reductions in spending on construction and repair of roads there as the Kremlin has shifted funding from such infrastructure projects to the financing of Putin’s war in Ukraine have only made the situation worse, as many older roads are becoming impassable
The Association proposal is thus an attempt to restart construction, but as Mironov’s protest suggests, it is something that will anger many Russians not only in distant regions like the Far East but also Russians elsewhere who have concluded that toll roads alone may not tie the country together but increase the danger of disintegration.
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