International bidding will open on 28 June for line one of Bogotá’s metro.
Empresa Metro de Bogotá (EMB) selected a shortlist of six teams for the project in April:
- Consorcio Metro de Bogotá FCC (Spain) and Carso Infraestructura y Construcción (Mexico)   Â
- APCA Metro Capital Siemens (Germany) and Controladora de Operaciones de Infraestructura (Mexico), Strukton (Netherlands)Â Â Â Â Â
- Consorcio Sunrise Hitachi (Japan), Acciona (Spain), Salini Impregilo (Italy)
- APCA Transmimetro China Harbour Engineering Â
- Consorcio Linea 1 CCR Group, Camargo Correa (Brazil), Construtora Andrade Gutierrez (Brazil), OHL Group (Spain)Â Â Â Â
- Union Metro Capital Sacyr Group (Spain), Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles (Spain), Hyundai Motor Group (South Korea)
ESB has held both group and individual company feedback meetings with members of the consortiums to ensure construction will be carried out smoothly.
The consortiums will have until the end of September to present their offers, and the winner will be announced in October.
Andrés Escobar, EMB manager, said: "For us as a metro company, the commitment goes beyond choosing the best consortium; we are mainly concerned that the development of the works is carried out with the least setbacks and cost overruns, and that depends critically on the contractual documentation that we are preparing."
The concession contract for the metro will last 25 years.
The elevated line will be the first in Bogotá, a city of some 8 million people that at present relies on a bus rapid transit network, which opened in 2000. Â
The idea for a metro was first proposed in 1967. This latest version is expected to cost around $4.3bn, with $480m of that coming from a loan from the European Investment Bank. Â
The winning consortium will design, build and partially fund the line, as well as providing the rolling stock. It will then operate the system for 20 years. Â
Image: Bogotá depends on its bendy buses for mass transit (Felipe Restrepo Acosta/CC BY-SA 3.0)
