Tenders for the QR2.5bn ($687m) Lusail Expressway and phase 1b the QR20bn Musheireb project have been delayed.

Qatar’s Public Works Authority (Ashghal) has still to tender the main construction package for the Lusail Expressway. Prequalified contractors had been previously told to expect the release of the tender documents by 21 December.

 “The Lusail highway is complex and it is already behind [schedule], but it will be tendered within the next 30 days,” Jamal Shareeda al-Kaabi, manager of roads and drainage networks design at Ashghal, told MEED in November 2010.

The project had already been delayed as tenders were initially due to go out in August. Contractors now expect the project to be tendered by the end of January (MEED 26:11:10).

The road will be about 12 kilometres long and will run from Doha city to Lusail and then on to the Pearl. It will have about 16 lanes, some of which will reach up to two or three levels. The expressway will also include three major interchanges, slip roads, underpasses and bicycle lane. Construction work will take 36 months to complete.

Local developer Dohaland has also delayed issuing the tender documents for the phase 1b construction package on its Musheireb project.

Dohaland has drawn up a shortlist of contractors that it will invite to bid for the project, and was expected to tender the project by the end of December 2010. However, contractors have still not received the tender documents, and have now been told to expect them by the end fo February.

Phase 1b of the urban regeneration project will involve the construction of a multi-use cultural forum, offices, hotel and serviced apartments, shopping district, townhouses, school and a mosque.

In April, Dohaland awarded a QR1.6bn contract to the joint venture of South Korea’s Hyundai Engineering & Construction Company and the local HBK Contracting Company to build phase 1a of the development (MEED 26:4:10).