Chile preparing to re-tender, expand major highways

Following massive traffic jams on the Ruta 68 highway, which connects Chilean capital Santiago with port city Valparaíso, over the Easter weekend, public works minister Juan Andrés Fontaine said the government is studying plans to expand the capacity of that road and two others.

The other two highways under study are Ruta 78 (Santiago-San Antonio) and Ruta 5 (the country's main north-south highway), with the possible upgrades including more lanes and other improvements.

These three highways are also included in one of the central points of the government's infrastructure agenda: The re-tendering of the concessions for the country's major highways.

Prior to last year's elections, Piñera presented an infrastructure program with a heavy focus on concessions, which entailed an eight-year US$30bn public works plan.

When it came to the concession of the country's major roads, the program outlines that the highways that would be tendered have a total length of around 1,500km and projected investments in them would be some US$2.5bn in 2018-2022.

"The goal is to turn the entirety of Route 5 into a four-lane highway between Arica and Puerto Montt (3,000km), including six-lane roads at several points of the route," the program states.

Other aspects include improving 600km of secondary roads and building 14 bridges as alternatives to those on Ruta 5, so that travel times on these alternative routes does not surpass those on the main road highway by more than 1.5 times.

WHO OWNS THE ROADS

• Ruta 68: Currently operated by Rutas del Pacífico, a subsidiary of Spanish infrastructure group Abertis. The road runs for 141km, has four tunnels, 16 bridges and 22 bypasses, according to the public works ministry's (MOP) concessions office. The current concession is set to expire in August 2024.
• Ruta 78: Known as Autopista del Sol, it is currently operated by a similarly named concessionaire, which is also a subsidiary of Abertis. This route covers 131km and was awarded in 1995. The current concession contract is set to expire in March 2021, although Fontaine told Radio Duna this week that, as part of the plans to expand the capacity of the highway, the MOP was studying extending the current contract for 24 months to give the concessionaire time to finance the expansion.

It should be noted that a project to build a corridor linking Ruta 68 and Ruta 78 was awarded to Grupo Costanera in February.

The US$270mn contract entails building a 9.2km four-lane corridor between the Maipú and Pudahuel districts of Santiago, linking the two highways.

As for Ruta 5, the road is divided into several sections, which in some cases have different concessionaires. The ones that Piñera's government is aiming to re-tender are:

• Los Vilos-La Serena: Dubbed Ruta del Elqui, the road covers 229km between the cities of Los Vilos and La Serena in the Coquimbo region. The concessionaire, Rutas del Elqui, is also owned by Abertis and its contract is set to expire in December 2022. The previous government aimed to tender the road again last year, but it postponed the process. Before the Piñera administration took power, the then-public works minister, Alberto Undurraga, said that the definitive bidding documents would be published soon. The new contract has a budget of US$377mn and includes works on the urban sections of the highway, including widening it to six lanes.
• Santiago-Los Vilos: Covers 218km of roads and is operated by Globalvía subsidiary Autopista del Aconcagua, whose contract is set to expire in March 2023.
• Talca-Chillán: Entails 193km between the cities of Talca (Maule region) and Chillán (Ñuble region). It is currently operated by Ruta del Maule, which is owned by Intervial. The contract is set to expire in April 2020.
• Chillán-Collipulli: Covers 160km between Chillán and Collipulli (Araucanía region). The road is operated by Rutas del Bosque, another Intervial subsidiary, and its concession contract is set to expire in May 2020.
• Collipulli-Temuco: Runs for 144km between Collipulli and Araucanía capital Temuco. Currently operated by Ruta de la Araucanía, another Intervial subsidiary, its concession contract will expire in February 2023.
• Temuco-Río Bueno: Compromising 172km between Temuco and Río Bueno (Los Rios region), it is currently operated by Intervial concessionaire Ruta de Los Ríos, whose concession will expire in June 2023.

As for what the new tenders will involve, Fontaine said that the bidding process for these routes "will bring substantial improvements in user comfort and safety standards. We will add new lanes to several of these highways, we will have free-flow toll systems, we will have better connection roads and improvements to bridges, some of which are in a very dangerous state."