Colombia's concessions authority Inco plans to launch the tender for the concession of the Ruta del Sol highway in the last week of November, an Inco official told BNamericas.
The tender, which has suffered a number of delays, had previously been scheduled to launch in mid-November, but authorities are fine tuning a number of details and the date was pushed back a couple of weeks, the official said.
The project structure has already been determined by the World Bank'sInternational Finance Corporation, the official said, ruling out the possibility of further delays such as those suffered by the Nueva Independencia highway, whose tender has been postponed until next year.
Works on Ruta del Sol consist of expanding to four-lanes almost all of the highway stretch that connects capital Bogotá to the Santa Marta port, on the Caribbean sea, national planning department (DNP) head Carolina Rentería told BNamericas.
The concessionaire will be responsible for the rehabilitation and expansion of the already existing road, and for the construction of new stretches where necessary, as well as the maintenance and operation of the 1,000km highway.
The project is expected to require US$2bn-2.5bn, making it the second largest investment initiative in the region, after the Panama Canal expansion.
According to reports, the government will contribute at least US$1.2bn to support the initiative.
The tender process is expected to take around six months, Rentería said. According to past transport ministry reports, the project will take 8-10 years to complete.
The initiative is the first Colombian highway concession to be specifically structured to attract financial entities and pension funds, which has become the new government focus in terms of concession operators.
Once the project is complete, land cargo transport time from one end of the highway to the other is expected to drop from 24 hours to 14 hours.
In the meantime, the private sector continues to develop the Santa Marta port area to cope with the expected increase in cargo handling demand generated by the Ruta del Sol project, an official from the transport ministry told BNamericas.
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