MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Lula da Silva opens bid for a bullet train on time for the 2016 Summer Olympics

At least six countries have shown an interest in the 19 billion US dollars project

Brazilian President Lula da Silva launched Tuesday the bidding process for the construction of the high-speed rail service between the country’s two largest cities, Sao Paulo and Rio do Janeiro, which should be running by 2016 when Brazil hosts the Olympic Games.

The project is expected to cost the equivalent of 18.75 billion US dollars and bidding conditions specify that rights for the construction, operation and maintenance of the rail line for 40 years will be granted to the firm which ensures the lowest fare for the service between the megapolis.

The bidding process concludes December 16 at the Sao Paulo stock exchange when the sealed bids will be opened and the winner selected. The bill with the bidding process will be published Wednesday in the official gazette. Companies from Spain, France, Germany, China, South Korea and Japan have expressed a strong interest in the project.
The proposal calls for trains to run at speeds of up to 350 kph along the 510 kilometres route including nine stations and stops at Rio and Sao Paulo international airports. The trip between the two cities should take no longer than 97 minutes.

The corridor for the proposed bullet train is home to some 40 million people, 20% of the Brazilian population and straddling companies and industries that generate a third of the country’s GDP.

At the ceremony Lula da Silva fustigated those who didn’t believe the project would ever take off.

“At the start, it was said that nobody would be interested, that nobody would present a proposal. I had to talk with my friend (Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez) Zapatero and with my friend (French President) Nicolas Sarkozy to show that it was for real and serious”, said Lula da Silva.

The Brazilian president also signed the bill creating the High Speed Rail Transport Company which guarantees the state will have a share of the project and ensure that whoever wins technology transfer is also included. Brazil with a continental dimension has virtually no railway system. Government financing of the project is limited to 60%.

“In the last fifteen years nobody in this country has laid a single train rail”, said Lula da Silva promising that “we are going to furnish this country with good highways, waterways and railways system, and this has already taken off”.

Despite the fact that one of the criteria for the selection of a winner is the lowest fare, the National Agency for Land Transport has already established a cap of 28 US cents per kilometre which ensures the bullet train will compete with the Sao Paulo/Rio do Janeiro air shuttle. This means a maximum fare of 113 US dollars for the whole trip.

Brazilian officials estimate the project will get under way in late 2011, once all the environmental licenses are issued and should be concluded by 2015 in time for the Summer Olympics but too late for the 2014 World Cup.

An extension to Campinas, 70 kilometres from Sao Paulo has also been planned with the purpose of reaching the heartland of Brazil’s richest manufacturing and farming state.