Three bidders have submitted proposals for two road projects in Lahore, the client Lahore Development Authority (LDA) says. Paktoll and Portland, both of the UK and South Korea's Daewoo Corporation have bid for the construction of a ring-road and an elevated expressway. Paktoll is a consortium that includes Omani royal Kais Bin Tarik al-Said, Auscon Consultants of Oman, the local Shaheen Foundation, South Africa's Intertoll, the Athens-based Joannou & Paraskevaides (Overseas), South Korea's Sambu Construction Company and Sir William Halcrow & Partners, Balfour Beatty, AMEC and Westminster Project Management Group, all of the UK.

The ring-road will be about 78 kilometres long and will have three lanes in each direction. The scheme will include service roads, 11 interchanges and six flyovers. Estimated costs are $409 million. The elevated expressway will be five kilometres long and will have two lanes. It will be a toll road and will cost about $48 million to build.

LDA says that it hopes to appoint a developer to implement the projects on a build-operate-transfer (BOT) basis. Some of the bidders are understood to have proposed a combination of BOT and government funding. However, LDA says it would prefer a full BOT project. Some of the members of the Paktoll consortium had received a letter of intent for the construction of the ring-road from the government of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. However, the new government decided that the scheme should be rebid (MEED 26:9:97).