Reconstruction of the Karakoram Highway the China-Pakistan Friendship Tunnels can be traced to 2013, when China began construction on a bypass of Attabad Lake with a combination of 5 km worth of tunnels, two large bridges, and 78 small bridges to bypass the lake which had been formed after a 2010 earthquake triggered massive landslides. The resulting landslides cut off both the Indus River and Karakoram Highway resulting in the formation of the reservoir. Prior to completion of the bypass, all vehicular traffic had to be loaded onto barges to traverse the new reservoir. Construction of the tunnels began in 2012 and required 36 months
Karakoram Highway Pakistani National Highway Authority (NHA) and China's State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) to rebuild and upgrade the Karakoram Highway. According to SASAC, the width will be expanded from , and its transport capacity will be increased three times its current capacity. In addition, the upgraded road will be designed to particularly accommodate heavy-laden vehicles and extreme weather conditions. China and Pakistan are planning to link the Karakoram Highway to the southern port of Gwadar in Balochistan through the Chinese-aided Gwadar-Dalbandin railway, which extends to Rawalpindi. On 4 January 2010, the KKH was closed in the Hunza Valley, eliminating