CHILE: Balfour Beatty plc announced on May 14 that its Chilean subsidiary had been awarded contracts worth a total of £37m to undertake tracklaying on two extensions to the Santiago metro. Under a contact worth £10·2m, work on the 3·8 km section of Line 1 from Escuela Militar to Los Dominicos is scheduled for completion in September 2009.
The second contract worth £26·7m covers the 14·2 km of Line 5 from Quinta Normal to Plaza de Maipú, which is also to be operated with rubber-tyred rolling stock. Operator Metro SA says that the first section as far as Pudahuel is due to be handed over in December 2009, with the second phase to Plaza de Maipú opening in early 2010.
'With this contract, we will be looking to further build upon the successes achieved on lines 4 and 4A', said Manfred Leger, Group Managing Director, Rail, at Balfour Beatty. 'The guaranteed presence in Chile for the next three years also gives us the opportunity to grow in South America'.
