With next Monday marking the 35th anniversary of the Chornobyl fire,

Ukravtodor has repaved the 40 km road between Dyliatky checkpoint, the main entrance to the Exclusion Zone, and Pripyat town. “Our task is to put in order the popular tourist routes in three years and provide normal access to the Zone for conservationists, scientists, power engineers and entrepreneurs,” Alexander Kubrakov, Head of the State Highway Agency wrote on a Facebook post. He said that volume of tourists increased 15-fold in five years, from 8,000 in 2015 to 124,000 in 2019. He added: “Moreover, about 80% of them are international visitors.”