The General Directorate for National Roads and Motorways (GDDKiA) has commissioned over 20 km of the S61 expressway. The completed section of Wysokie-Raczki is an element of Via Baltica-international Road E67, linking Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia to Finland. The section of the road connecting the Warmińsko-Mazurskie and Podlaskie voivodships cost PLN 484 million.

GDDKiA commissioned an expressway with a dual carriageway cross-section with service roads, as part of the investment. Selected local roads were renovated and environmental protection solutions, as well as 25 engineering structures and the Kalinowo junction were added. The road surface was made of cement concrete and adapted to heavy traffic with a 11.5 tons load per axle.

Minister of Infrastructure Andrzej Adamczyk emphasized at the opening ceremony, that it is a new fragment of the Via Baltica international transport corridor, which drivers will start using this year. “The opening of this twenty-kilometer section of the S61 road is important not only from the point of view of Poland but also the entire Central and Eastern Europe. We have set ourselves the goal of building an international route that will directly connect the north and south of Europe. Today’s celebration proves that we will achieve this goal,” said minister Adamczyk.

The commissioned fragment of the S61 expressway is the first of three sections to be completed in the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship. In 2022, the section S61 Szczuczyn-Ełk Południe and the section from Suwałki to the border with Lithuania in Budzisko will be also put in action. In 2023, the construction of the Ełk Południe-Wysokie section will be completed.

Arkadiusz Słomczyński