Ministry of Transport in France is planning to launch a tender for Toulouse-Castres motorway project in south-west France in the second half of 2019 under public-private partnership model.

The project involves the development of motorway that will connect the french towns of Toulouse (capital of the department of Haute-Garonne) and Castres (department of Tarn). The toll motorway will be called A69. The project will feature 2x2 lanes. It will link Castres (Tarn) to Verfeil (Haute-Garonne) where it will join the route into Toulouse. It will be approximately 54 km long and the works will include the expansion of existing tracks and the creation of several kilometres of new ones. The new motorway will reduce the commute time from 1 hour to 45 minutes between two municipalities. 

The estimated cost of the concession is EUR 480 million (USD 538 million). The Occitanie region has agreed to commit EUR 60 million for the project and the communes of Sor and Agout have agreed in April this year to grant EUR 5 million loan over 30 years for the project.

The Toulouse-Castres motorway project studies were first done in 1994 and the motorway was declared more than 20 years later a project of public utility in 2018 after Minister of Transport Elisabeth Borne has made this project a priority. The declaration of the public utility published in the official journal states that all necessary expropriation of private property for public use would have to be implemented in 10 years period by 2028. A concession contract is expected to be signed in 2021 and works are expected to start in 2023.

Since the public utility declaration was signed, the land, agricultural and forestry development procedures were in progress, in conjunction with the departments of Tarn and Haute-Garonne, to limit the impact of the project on agricultural areas.

Castres with a population of 44,000 people is the largest town in France that doesn´t have a direct connection to a motorway.