Rönesans Holding announces financial closing for final section of Northern Marmara Motorway

The motorway, which will run overall for a total length of 400 kilometers, bypassing Istanbul, from Akyazi to the south east of the Turkish capital to the country’s new airport near Akpinar in Thrace, has largely been completed, except for the final 31.3km toll road between Nakkaş and Başakşehir.

The Rönesans Holding team at its closing ceremony. Photo: Rönesans Holding

At the ceremony Rönesans announced that the project that has received €1.43 billion (US$1.9 billion) in investment. Investors include the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), and the Islamic Development Bank - Islamic Corporation for the Development of the Private Sector (IsDB - ICD) as global development finance institutions (DFIs), along with Atradius and SERV as European export credit agencies, ICIEC, and a consortium of commercial lenders.

In 2020, the Turkish government awarded the Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) contract to build the project to a consortium led by Rönesans, which also includes Samsung C&T Corporation, KIND, KDB KIAMCO, and Korea Expressway Corporation.

The project is one of Türkiye’s highest-value investments in the road sector and includes a 1.6-kilometer cable-stayed bridge, and multiple overpasses and underpasses.

A solar energy generating system with capacity of 2MW will be installed, with clean energy from the solar panels set to power the motorway’s operations and management operations and maintenance centre and service stations. The project includes replacing 4,500 sodium lights with LEDs to reduce energy consumption by around 37.5% (35+ MWh) during the project lifetime. All operations and maintenance motorway vehicles will be hybrid or electric, saving an expected 112,000 liters of fuel consumption per year.

Erman Ilıcak, President of Rönesans Holding, said, “Not only will the motorway drastically cut travel times for individuals and businesses in Istanbul, it will also take the country’s sustainable development to the next level. This is a motorway of the future, built with people, society and the environment in mind – elements we hope to see replicated across global infrastructure projects moving forwards.”

Se Chul Oh, President and CEO of Samsung C&T said, “This project is expected to enhance economic cooperation between the two countries. Moreover, it holds a great significance as K-Team produces meaningful outcomes, bringing skilled technique and policy support from public organizations, including Korean Expressway Corporation, KIND and PIS Fund. We will keep this momentum going to create additional cooperative opportunities in Türkiye, CIS and Eastern European markets.”

Ankara headquartered Rönesans Holding is one of Türkiye’s largest contractors. Previous projects include President Erdoğan’s presidential palace complex in Ankara which was formally inaugurated in 2014 and the Gotthard Base Tunnel in Switzerland which was compelted in 2016.