Traffic Accident on Yerevan-Gyumri road

[A1plus | 16 July, 2007] A Mersedes car with 45 ՏՕ 005 number has hit a tree, then the metal electricity tower around 21:10, on July 15, which has caused the death of 5 of 7 passengers, while the 2 others have been taken to Gyumri hospital after Gyulbenkyan.

[Yerkir-Media | 16 July, 2007] also carries the sad news with a video update. As I personally travel this road nearly every weekend, I have to state, that this year only I’ve eye-witnessed 4 accidents on that road. The problem with the highway is that, while it was built back in the 70s, when cars were a relative rarity, nothing has been done to expand/widen it to meet the demands of the day. While the officials keep saying, that 18-20,000 new cars are entering Armenia every day, and while all the road infrastructure in Yerevan is under reconstruction, nobody has been talking even about any remote plans to expand the key road which connects Armenia with Georgia and is one of the three main import-export highways for the country. As the amount of cars, including large trucks carrying goods back and forth increases, the only sensible solution would have been to build a second road along the old one, and organize traffic on one direction on each segment. Even with that the amount of traffic would be very high, but at least the number of traffic accidents would decrease, and lives would be saved – which is all that matters after all, isn’t it?