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By Arnoldo Cob
Mora
of the A.M. Costa
Rica staff
Transport officials said Tuesday that the bulk of
the money for the San José-Caldera has been allocated and that work on the
77-kilometer (48-mile) stretch will begin in April.
This is the long-awaiting highway that will provide a
faster route to the Pacific and probably will have an impact of real estate
prices along the route at the beaches.
Travelers headed west out of
San José to
Caldera are expected to save almost an hour after the completion of planned
highway.
Officials announced that beginning in April the project will
begin. It is in three stages: improvement of the section from San José to Ciudad Colón,
a new highway from Cuidad Colón to Orotina, and improvement of the
Orotina-Caldera highway.
The highway includes the Autopista Próspero
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Fernández, which runs from Parque La Sabana to midway
between Santa
Ana and Ciudad Colón as a four-lane divided road. The
bridges have been constructed in the new section for more than five years, but
various legalisms and the acquisition of property have stalled
construction.
The work will be done by Autopistas del Sol, which holds a
concession. The firm has 60 persons ready to start to work. All the machinery,
including gravel and asphalt plants already are in the country, said a release
by the Ministerio de Obras Públicas y Transportes.
The cost will be
approximately $200 million dollars. Funding was approved for the project by the
Banco Centroamericano de Integración Económica, that will provide 80 percent of
the needed capital, said the transport ministry.
The bank loan will be
paid back to the Banco Centroamericano de Integración Económica with money
collected from tolls. The fee is expected to cost around $3.60 for the entire
trip, said the transport ministry.
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