By Giselle Alzate | 2024-04-09

BOGOTA -- The Bogotá subway's first line has been plagued by persistent delays in studies and designs, potentially pushing back the completion of work.

Ana Teresa Bernal, vice president of the Bogotá City Council, cautioned that the Chinese consortium Metro Linea 1 is facing delays that might extend the project up to four years beyond the estimated completion year of 2028.

"The commencement of operations for @MetroBogota could be delayed by another four years, as indicated by the ... PLMB [First Line of the Bogotá Metro] audit," she stated.

"The delays in the detailed studies, designs and execution of various activities are worrisome and reinforce our ongoing complaints," Bernal posted on X April 6.

The Bogotá councilor was citing the February report from the auditor PLMB, which highlighted that if current slowness in submitting studies and designs persists, the Chinese consortium would need an additional 47 months to complete the subway system's designs.

The sluggish progress of recent months has cast doubts on the ability of the Chinese companies to complete the project on schedule.

Construction has been proceeding for 41 months.

"The false and irresponsible hopes and subway campaigns for Bogotá ... are not going to yield results within the originally planned time frame," Bernal remarked.

Indices of progress have been consistently negative in the past seven months, she said.

Delays and inefficiencies

In February, an aerial inspection of the construction site for the first line of the Bogotá subway revealed delays and inefficiencies in the project.

Colombian Transport Minister William Camargo and Treasury Minister Ricardo Bonilla viewed the challenges firsthand via helicopter on February 11 when they flew over the construction sites of the Bogotá subway, the most significant ongoing infrastructure project in Colombia.

The project is under the management of Metro Linea 1, a consortium of the state-owned China Harbor Engineering Co. Ltd. (CHEC) and Xi'an Rail Transportation Group.

Metro Linea 1 secured the contract and signed the concession agreement with Bogotá Metro Co. on November 27, 2019.

Subsequently, various irregularities, particularly in 2023, came to to light, with the Chinese consortium facing fines exceeding 800 million COP (approximately $200,000) for failing to meet deadlines for submitting preliminary studies and designs.

Failure in Africa

CHEC already foundered on a project in Africa.

In January 2023, Uganda announced the termination of its contract with CHEC for the construction of a railway connecting the capital, Kampala, to the Kenyan border.

The contract specified that China was to assist in financing the project, but this support failed to materialize over seven years, as reported by Reuters.

Bolivia, Costa Rica, Honduras and Jamaica have all complained about trying to work with CHEC on infrastructure construction, citing delays and low-quality materials.