At the end of June, 2015 the drill/blast construction of the 6.5 km-long twin-tube Mount Kop tunnel, between Maden, Bayburt in the northwest in Black Sea Region, and Aşkale, Erzurum, in the southeast in Eastern Anatolia Region, reached 4 km. The EUR134 million project, part of the E97 route in Erzurum-Bayburt-Trabzon D925 state road, was launched in 2012 and is scheduled to be opened in 2017.

The Mount Kop Tunnel, on the Silk Road route and at 2,050 m elevation, will be the shortest way to connect Gurbulak, Turkey’s border gate to Iran, and Trabzon port. It will shorten the route by about 6 km and reduce the travel time to one hour. Visit http://www.kgm.gov.tr/. 27/15.