ACS and FCC have begun construction on Line 2 of the Lima Metro (Peru), a project they were awarded as a consortium last year for 3.62 billion euros.
It is one of the largest infrastructure projects secured by Spanish companies abroad, along with the Panama Canal, the high-speed rail line to Mecca, and the Riyadh Metro, and one of the most important transportation infrastructure projects in Peru’s history.
The president of the Latin American country, Ollanta Humala, presided over the groundbreaking ceremony for the Lima metro at an event held at one of the future train yards for the new infrastructure, which was also attended by representatives of the companies in the winning consortium, according to FCC.
The project calls for the construction of a 35-kilometer-long metro line with 35 stations, which will connect the city of Lima from east to west and also includes an 8-kilometer branch line to the airport.
The construction project follows a phased schedule, so that the infrastructure will be fully completed by 2020.
The consortium awarded the project—led by FCC and ACS and including the local firm Cosapi and the Italian companies Impregilo and Ansaldi—will use two tunnel-boring machines to build the underground section of the metro line; these machines are capable of excavating about fifteen meters per day.
It is estimated that construction work on this metro line will create 3,000 jobs and that, once it becomes operational, it will carry approximately one million passengers per day, connecting the eastern part of Lima with the port of Callado in the west, in a travel time of about 45 minutes, compared to the up to two and a half hours it can currently take.
