The 231 km Central Greece Motorway E-65 includes a segment running north-west/south-east through central Greece and a segment of the Patra-Athens-Thessaloniki (PATHE) toll road.
The road concession runs for 30 years.
The consortium is short-listed for a third project and has bid for a fourth concession; together, those two projects represent a total investment of close to 3 billion euro.
A consortium including Cintra, a toll-road and car-park company, today signed the concession with the Greek Government to build, finance, operate, maintain and exploit the Central Greece Motorway (E65). The Greek government had selected the Hispano-Greek consortium as provisional contractor on 7 February. The project is estimated to cost about 1.5 billion euro and the concession will run for 30 years.
This will be Cintra’s second toll road in Greece, where it has already bid for a third project and is short-listed for a fourth (those two projects represent a projected investment of close to 3 billion euro). The partners in the contract are Cintra (33.34%), ACS Group (33.33%) and GEK, a Greek construction company (33.33%). The road measures 231 km in total and comprises two sections: – the Central Greece segment, to built entirely by the consortium, measures 174 km and runs north-west/south-east through central Greece, connecting the city of Egnatia to the PATHE (Patra-Athens-Thessaloniki) toll road. – the other segment, which measures 57 km., will be built by the Greek government and transferred to the concession company.
The newly-built road will come into service in approximately 66 months. The road is expected to become operational by the end of 2009, when part of the road to be built by the Government will be transferred to the concession company.
The bulk of the finance, 948.7 million euro, will be in the form of senior bank debt without recourse to the partners. The consortium will contribute another 65 million euro, 66.7 million euro will be raised as subordinated debt, and the other 500 million euro will be a subsidy from the State.
Second toll road in Greece
Cintra obtained its first toll road in Greece in June 2006 when it was selected to manage the Ionian Roads project under a 30-year concession; that project represents an investment of over 1 billion euro. Both projects are part of the toll road plan implemented by Greece’s Ministry of National Economy (MONE) and the Ministry of the Environment, Planning and Public Works (MEPPPW) to promote the construction and improvement of strategic sections of the national road network, with private-sector participation in design, construction, financing and operation.The Toll Road Programme includes concessions for six toll roads, in two batches, that represent a total investment of 8 billion euro.
Companies may only bid for four projects at most
Two new projects for an investment of 3 billion euro. The consortium of which Cintra is a member has also bid for the concession to build and operate the 360 km CSB Corinth-Patra-Pirgos-Tsakona road, of which 297 km are to be newly built, and it is short-listed for the Attica Urban Roads concession, involving the construction and operation of 47 km (36 km of new construction), which is expected to be decided in 2007. The two projects together represent capital expenditure of close to 3 billion euro. Cintra, one of the world’s largest private-sector transport infrastructure developers Cintra, a subsidiary of Grupo Ferrovial, is one of the world’s leading private-sector developers of transport infrastructure, with over 15 billion euro in managed investments. With this new project, Cintra has a stake in a total of 20 toll road concessions in Spain (7), Ireland (1), Greece (2), Portugal (2), Chile (5), Canada (1) and the USA (2). It currently has three projects pending final award, in Italy, Ireland and the USA, and it is waiting for Ferrovial Infraestructuras to transfer the Azores (Portugal) toll road concession. Cintra is also Spain’s leading car park operator and manages over 250,000 parking spaces.
