Challenges of Implementing the National Project “Safe and High-Quality Roads” in Today’s Conditions

The development of an advanced, comfortable, and reliable transportation infrastructure is essential for improving the quality of life for citizens. The national project “Safe and High-Quality Roads,” implemented in Russia since 2016, aims to address these tasks. This research aims to identify and systematize the problems and risks negatively impacting the achievement of the planned indicators of the “Safe and High-Quality Roads” project at the present stage and develop proposals aimed at mitigating them. The results of the research identified key issues in implementing the “Safe and High-Quality Roads” project, namely: (1) the rising cost of construction materials and increasing costs and shortages of road construction equipment, (2) a lack of qualified specialists in the road construction industry, (3) persistent risks of substandard work, (4) increasing load on the transportation network, leading to risks of deteriorating its operational condition and capacity, (5) insufficient and irregular financial support for the national project, and (6) an excessively low share of non-budgetary funding sources. The measures proposed by the authors to overcome these problems can be utilized by government authorities to minimize the emerging risks of failing to meet the project’s target indicators and improve the implementation mechanism and financial support of the project.