NOVO-OGAREVO, March 05. /ITAR-TASS/. Investments in construction of a Kerch bridge may exceed 50 billion rubles (around $1.3 billion), and implementation of the project may take three and a half years, Russian Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov told reporters on Wednesday.

“Three and a half years is the minimal term,” he said.

According to the presidential instruction and the roadmap plan it was planned to finalize a feasibility study in this year, after that construction would be launched involving investment non-budgetary sources and budget resources in adjusted state-funded program.

“However, in any case all four or five variants to build a bridge crossing without a railway track envisage massive financial resources of at least 50 billion rubles,” Sokolov said, noting that if it was decided to build a bridge with a railway track funding may be larger.

The minister noted that standard term for building such facilities is around 40 months. Meanwhile, terms will be shorter with due account of experience of urgent construction of a bridge on Russky Island in the Russian far eastern city of Vladivostok.

Late in February the Russian Finance Ministry has suspended talks with Ukraine over implementation of the bridge construction project across the Kerch Strait amid tense events in Ukraine, Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov told Itar-Tass. “For clear reasons we are not in concrete talks now. Although until recently we have been working actively with the previous Ukrainian government over construction of a Kerch bridge and have advanced strictly in line with the presidential instruction. We hope that the situation will stabilize and we will continue all these projects,” he said.

The agreement on joint steps in building a bridge crossing across Kerch Strait was signed in Moscow in December 2013.