Skip to main content

Colombia's roads to recovery

Colombia's Ministry of Transport is suggesting that the Avenida Longitudinal de Occidente (ALO) road project in Bogota should be carried out by Colombian energy company Empresa de Energia de Bogota (EEB).
February 8, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
Colombia's Ministry of Transport is suggesting that the Avenida Longitudinal de Occidente (ALO) road project in Bogota should be carried out by Colombian energy company 5808 Empresa de Energia de Bogota (EEB). If state owned EEB completes the works, the Government expects to save US$518 million as well as cutting out the need for three years worth of additional studies and tenders. Meanwhile the tender process for the Autopista de las Americas highway project should close at the end of April 2010, with a decision to be made in June 2010. The 4.2km Guillermo Leon Valencia tunnel is now open for traffic. Vehicles driving from Melgar to Bogota will no longer have to travel via Nariz del Diablo, and journey times will be shortened by more than 30 minutes. The cost of this tunnel project was estimated at $70 million when announced in 2002. The Ministry of Transport reports that the Bogota-Giradot road project is progressing well although there have been some delays. The road project will improve communications between Central Colombia and the west as well as the Pacific Coast. Some 200km of double lane road projects have been built on average during the last two years and this could reach 300km in 2010. In addition, La Linea tunnel construction works are finally proceeding as planned and the road from Calarca to this tunnel is within schedule. The Bogota-Buenaventura road should be completed within a maximum of five years. The Colombian authorities have signed the extensions to the Ruta Caribe, Barranquilla-Cartagena and Cordoba-Sucre road concessions. These projects are worth $623 million. Other road projects worth have been put out to tender and contracts for these schemes will be signed in June 2010. By extending the concessions, the government will be able to ensure that the works are carried out, through road toll systems. The Colombian institute for concessions, 1314 INCO, has remarked that the Cordoba-Sucre and Ruta Caribe projects should take seven years to complete and encompass 484km of road improvements.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Tough time for tolls
    July 3, 2012
    Spain’s tough economic conditions have resulted in difficult times for the country’s private toll highway operators. A fall in revenue has combined with a tough financial situation to make it difficult to pay off debts. Spain’s Ministry of Public Works is offering potential help with a new viability plan for tolled highways. This would involve merging weak, loss-making highways with long concession contracts, with highways that are profitable. Several options meet this criteria but the sector considers the
  • Costa Rica concrete repairs
    February 15, 2012
    Work has started on the long awaited San Jose-Caldera Highway in Costa Rica, following numerous delays and setbacks. The new 77.5km highway will be used daily by more than 81,000 vehicles, reducing the travel time between the Central Valley and the Central Pacific Coast by at least 30 minutes.
  • Mota-Engil wins Cardel-Poza Rica motorway contract in Mexico
    June 13, 2014
    Mexico's Secretarat of Communications of Transport (SCT) has awarded the contract to build the Cardel-Poza Rica motorway to Portuguese company Mota-Engil. The proposal made by the company, together with PRODI, of US$266.48 million (MXN 3.47 billion), was deemed the most feasible technically and financially. The offer was below the $307.53 million (MXN 4 billion) estimated for the project in the National Infrastructure Plan (PNI). The road will be located in Veracruz, spanning 129km between Laguna Verde and
  • Consortia compete for Colombian construction and concession contract
    June 4, 2014
    Colombia's US$561 million Perimetral de Oriente de Cundinamarca4G highway concession package has received bids from four different consortia. Business News Amercas reports that this is the highest number of bidders that a 4G highway concession has received since the country’s national infrastructure agency, ANI, started receiving bids in April for its first wave of nine highway concessions. There were comparatively few bidders for the first three projects so ANI made a number of changes, including revising