Hanoi is carrying out a project to pave 936 streets in 12 districts across the city from now until 2020 with natural stone which are supposed to last for 50-70 years.
To date, many streets have been paved with natural stone. However, some of the pavements in Cau Giay, Thanh Xuan and Hoan Kiem districts have shown cracks.
New stones on Le Trong Tan pavements have broken
Le Trong Tan Street in Thanh Xuan District was the first street in Hanoi paved with natural stone. However, just over a year after being installed, cracks have been found on the street. Many of the paving stones have even been broken.
The same problem is also seen on Tran Huy Hung Street in Cau Giay District. Le Kim Phung who works as a security guard on street said that subsidence appeared some months ago following heavy rains.
Nguyen Trai and Trung Kinh streets have also suffered the same fate.
Newly paved sidewalk on Nguyen Trai Street
Regarding the deterioration of the natural stone-paved streets, Tran Viet Trung, deputy director of the Hanoi Department of Construction, said that the duration of natural stones also depends on the quality of concrete layer beneath. Meanwhile, the concrete layer is often affected by piping or tree roots.
He also added that the department has proposed Hanoi authorities to pave natural stone on streets which have deteriorated but not all.
Some local experts said that natural stone should be used at some certain areas of Hanoi such as the Old Quarter or pedestrian streets to save costs. They said that Hanoi needs to reconsider this as it would be useless to spend that money on the city’s pavements only for it to be illegally encroached upon by private businesses as at present.
Some of Hanoi’s inner city streets paved with natural stone have been seriously deteriorated after around a year from being installed
