In this video you can drive along on Montenegro's recently opened first motorway: The A1 E65 from Podgorica to Kolašin. This is a first 41 kilometer segment that was opened this summer.

Plans for a first motorway from the Adriatic Sea to the border with Serbia had been established for a while. After a lot of back and forth on the project and a lack of funding (the total project was estimated at 2.5 billion EUR), Montenegro turned to the Chinese and their well-known China Road and Bridge Corporation.

They effectively started work in 2015 after concluding the agreement in 2014. Excavation of most tunnels started around 2017-2018. As you will see in the video, there is quite an amount of tunnels and spectacular bridges on this stretch of Motorway. Montenegro's geography is quite challenging, further bumping up the construction cost.

The future A1 is supposed to take travellers from the coastal city of Bar on the Adriatic Sea to the border with Serbia via the country's capital Podgorica. Effectively the entire project is divided up in 3 phases, of which the middle phase now has been constructed. The total anticipated length of the motorway will be some 163 kilometers.

In the South near Bar the motorway will run along the coast for a bit until it turns inland. It will then bypass Podgorica on the West side before it joins this recently opened section just North of Podgorica. The third segment will continue near Kolašin and will be one of the more challenging to construct, as it will take the motorway through some mountainous terrain. It will pass the mountain city of Berane before reaching the border with Serbia.

The Motorway is very pleasant to drive and has the latest technologies for surveillance and monitoring. On the surface it seems to be built to a high standard, time will tell how it will age. At the moment the motorway doesn't really lead anywhere and also the roads from the capital to reach the start of the motorway have not been upgraded yet.

When finished, the motorway will undoubtedly bring more prosperity to Montenegro as the country, largely dependent on tourism, will be much more easier to access. The question is to what extent this anticipated increase in prosperity will keep up with the due loans and financing contracts from China.

As this motorway kind of leads to nowhere I really went out of my way to drive here and film this. So if you enjoyed this content, please consider subscribing to my channel or leave a comment / like, it would be highly appreciated 🙂

Distance driven in this video: approximately 50 kilometers
Toll paid: 3,50 EUR

#Autoput #A1 #Montenegro #E65 #Kolasin #Podgorica

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Driving route:

0:00 Intro & Map
0:45 Podgorica - A1 Motorway
4:35 A1 Podgorica - Exit Pelev Brijeg
9:35 Exit Pelev Brijeg - Exit Veruša
11:52 Exit Veruša - End of A1 Motorway (Mataševo)
16:00 M9 Mataševo - Kolašin