Existed: 2020 – present South end: Hyderabad (M9) Constructed 2020 | North end: Sukkur (M5) Length 296 km | |
Major cities Nawabshah, Khairpur, Shahdadpur, Matiari, Naushahro Feroze | ||
The M6 (Urdu: موٹروے 6) is a proposed north-south motorway in Pakistan, which will connect Sukkur to Hyderabad. The 296 km long motorway will become a vital link to connecting Karachi to Peshawar. The motorway will cost approximately $1.7 billion to build. The motorway project will require the construction of several interchanges, and 25 bridges on the Indus river and irrigation canals.
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The project is being built as part of the larger Eastern Alignment of the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). In August 2016, Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif formally approved the project, although contracts for construction are to be announced at a later date.
Route
At its southern terminus, the M6 motorway will connect to the M9 motorway at Jamshoro for onward connections to Karachi. The route will then course towards the northeast, and connect to the N55 Indus Highway via an interchange. It will continue to course towards the northeast to connect to the city of Hyderabad, via an intersection with the N-5 National Highway. From there the road will course towards the north towards the cities of Matiari, Tando Adam, Shahdadpur and Nawabshah in central Sindh. It will then continue northwards towards Khairpur, and finally course northeast again towards the city of Rohri, which lies across the Indus River from Sukkur in northern Sindh province. From Rohri, a controlled access motorway will continue onwards towards Multan and Islamabad.
Financing
Construction of the motorway is to cost an estimated $1.7 billion. While the government of China has extended low interest concessionary loans to cover large portions of CPEC infrastructure projects, the government of Pakistan in July 2016 decided to allow international bidding for the project, citing difficulty meeting Pakistan's required financial contributions for utilization of concessionary Chinese loans. Chinese and South Korean companies have reportedly shown early interest in the project.