Two more lanes will be added to the Marsa-Ħamrun bypass to ease the traffic at this bottleneck, Transport Minister Ian Borg said on Tuesday.

One lane will stretch back to the Marsa-bound exit of the Santa Venera tunnels. While another lane would also be added to the north bound side of the bypass.

“It is pointless doing major projects like the Kappara fly over, the December 13 project and the new works in Marsa, if we have a bottleneck like this in the middle of all these projects causing traffic,” Dr Borg said.

Watch: Marsa junction team reassures drivers - traffic will continue to flow

The project, spread over a number of phases, will cost some €5 million and is expected to take around 13 months to be completed.

Dr Borg said he had spent 11 minutes stuck inside the Santa Venera tunnels ahead of the press conference – a delay that was effecting thousands of commuters every day.

The government had ordered a study on the traffic flow a few months ago, and had already started preliminary works on the project to ensure it was not left on the backburner, he added.

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