The Latin American Herald Tribune a écrit:Brazil Invites Bids on Bullet-Train ProjectRIO DE JANEIRO – Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Tuesday launched the bidding for the construction of the TAV high-speed rail service between the country’s two largest cities, a project expected to cost 33 billion reais ($18.75 billion).
The schedule of conditions for the bidding specifies that the rights for the construction, operation and maintenance of the rail line for 40 years will be granted to the firm that commits itself to charging the lowest fare for the service between Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.
Interested companies will be able, starting Tuesday, to enter the bidding, which will end on Dec. 16 when the sealed bids will be opened and the winner selected.
The proposal calls for trains to run at speeds of up to 350 kph (217 mph) along the 510.8-kilometer (317-mile) route, and for nine stations to be built on the line, including stops at the Rio and Sao Paulo international airports.
The trip between the two cities would take 97 minutes.
The corridor for the proposed TAV is home to some 40 million people – 20 percent of the Brazilian population – and to firms and industries that generate a third of the country’s gross domestic product.
Lula said that the bidding will finally get under way a project in which nobody believed at first and it will offer in Brazil the same quality transportation as is available in developed countries.
“At the beginning, it was said that nobody would be interested, that nobody would present a proposal. I had to talk with my friend (Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez) Zapatero and with my friend (French President) Nicolas Sarkozy to show that it was something serious,” said Lula at the opening of the bidding.
“The interest of several firms in presenting offers shows that it’s possible to combine their technological seriousness with the seriousness of Brazil’s economic growth,” he added.
The bidding is open to both Brazilian and foreign firms.
Despite the fact that one of the criteria for the selection of a winner is the lowest fare, the National Agency for Terrestrial Transport has already established that the concessionaire cannot charge more than 28 cents per kilometer, a limit meant to ensure that the TAV is competitive with existing passenger air service between Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.
At that rate, a passenger could travel from one city to the other for around 199 reais ($113).
Companies from Japan, South Korea, China, France, Austria, Spain and Germany have expressed interest in bidding on the contract to build the system and operate it for 40 years.
The winner will only be able to have access to public loans in Brazil up to a maximum of 19.9 billion reais ($11.3 billion), that is to say 60.3 percent of the scheduled cost of the project.
Brazilian officials calculate that the work will get under way in late 2011, once all the corresponding environmental licenses are issued, and it will conclude in 2015.
The project has suffered a number of delays, and thus the railway will not be operating before the 2014 World Cup, contrary to what the government had originally intended, but it is still on schedule to be completed before the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio.
In addition to opening the bidding, Lula signed a law creating a state company, ERAV, the objective of which will be to plan and promote the development of other high-speed rail lines in the country.
ETAV, which will have access to the technology of the firm that builds the Rio-Sao Paulo line, will be able to plan, construct and operate new lines.
// EFE