Cintra enters the Italian infrastructure market with a 944 million euro toll road management contract

Press releases

Cintra to design, build, finance and operate, for 55 years, the Mantua-Cremona toll road (59.3 km) in Northern Italy Bid by the consortium headed by Cintra improves substantially on the development period envisaged for the entire toll road With this project, Cintra will manage 19 toll roads in Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Chile, the US and Canada Cintra is one of the world's largest private sector transport infrastructure developers, with committed investment of 2 billion euro Madrid, 14 December 2005. Cintra has been provisionally awarded the concession to design, build, finance and operate a toll road between the cities of Cremona and Mantua in northern Italy. The 59.3-kilometre road, under a 55-year concession, represents an investment of 943.8 million euro and is Cintra's debut in the Italian privately-financed transport infrastructure development market. Mantua-Cremona will be the first concession project in Italy to be managed by a foreign-led consortium. The final award of the concession is expected within weeks, followed by signature of the contract. Cintra bid for the contract - to be awarded by the Lombardy region through state-owned company Infrastrutture Lombarde Spa as the leader (68%) of a consortium with Italian partner Merloni Finanziaria. The consortium led by Cintra, which has been chosen as provisionally awarded, competed in a very close race against two rivals: an Italian group and an Italian-French group. The design and construction of the road (total estimated investment: 600 million euro) will be carried out by Ferrovial's construction subsidiary, Ferrovial Agromán, under a contract with a fixed price and deadline. Substantial improvement on the planned development schedule for the toll road The tender specifications envisaged construction in three phases: a first 36.1-kilometre stretch between Cremona and the Tibre toll road, to be built immediately. The remaining 23.2 kilometres were to be developed in two phases within at most 15 and 20 years, respectively, after entry into service of phase I. The bid presented by Cintra and its partner involved a substantial improvement on the development period for the entire toll road: it envisages building the entire toll road immediately, bringing phases II and III into service just ten months after phase I comes into operation (scheduled for 2011). Toll reviews Tolls will average 0.0575 per kilometre for light vehicles at 2005 prices, adjusted annually for Italian inflation. The project allows, additional to the inflation, a 20% and 25% toll increase when the phases II and III entry to service, respectively. Close to 1.4 billion euro in investment capacity Cintra is actively bidding for many projects and is prequalified or in the running for another 11 toll road projects in Europe (Spain, Ireland, Greece and Poland) and the United States. Nevertheless, the company has the capacity to invest close to 1.4 billion euro in the next few years to finance future growth as a result of cash on hand and cash flow envisaged in 2006-2010, as well as the possibility of releveraging its projects. One of the world's largest private-sector transport infrastructure developers Cintra, a subsidiary of Ferrovial, is one of the world's leading private-sector developers of transport infrastructure, with committed investment of 2 billion euro in concession companies' equity. Cintra operates over 1,700 kilometres of toll road that represent a managed investment around 10 billion euro. With the Mantua-Cremona project, Cintra will be managing nineteen toll roads, in Spain (9), Portugal (2), Ireland (1), Italy (1), Chile (4), Canada (1) and the USA (1). In the United States, Cintra is also strategic partner of the State of Texas in the design and planning of the Trans-Texas Corridor. In Ireland, the company has been selected as provisional preferred bidder for another toll road project, the M3, involving an investment of 600 million euro for a 45-year concession. Cintra is also Spain's leading car park operator and manages over 238,000 parking spaces, most of them in Spain.

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