 The money went to pay for the construction of the tunnel by Spölur.The original plan assumed it would take 20 years (until 2018) to pay back the cost of building the tunnel and that the tunnel would be turned over to the state at that point, but the traffic volume has proved to be significantly higher than originally projected.The volume of traffic is so high that the operator of the tunnel has suggested building a new tunnel alongside the current one because traffic is reaching the threshold mandated by a European regulation (8,000 vehicles daily) under which traffic in opposing directions should be separated.