The Minister of Transport and Public Works of Uruguay, Victor Rossi, has announced the tender processes to develop two road PPP projects.

The Government will now release the draft tender documents and potential bidders can send comments and proposals to the documents from January 5. On January 20, the Government will open the final tender process and April 14 will be the deadline to receive economic and technical proposals.

The road projects to be developed on a PPP basis are the following:

• Upgrade, development, operation and maintenance of the routes 12, 54, 55 and 57 and the Carmelo bypass
• Upgrade, development, operation and maintenance of the routes 9 and 15.

Both projects will use an availability-payment structure, with the concessionaire being paid by the adequate state of the routes during the operation period.

In a press conference hold by the Ministry of Transport in mid December, Mr. Rossi also announced the schedule for four other road PPP contracts:

• Western stretch of Route 14 up to Sarandí del Yí - 17 March 2016
• Western stretch of Route 26 up to Tacuarembó - 17 March 2016
• Eastern stretch of Route 14 from Sarandí Yí to Rocha - 16 July 2016
• Route 6 Motevideo exit through Avenida de las Instrucciones - 16 July 2016

The government of Uruguay has plans to improve the country's road system. It is expected that several projects involving about 4,270 km of roads will be carried out.

In October 2015, we reported that a Sacyr-led team was selected as the preferred bidder to develop three sections of the route 21 and 24 through a PPP model. The 179 km road project will involve the development of the section 2 of the route 21 and the sections 2 and 3 of the route 24.

The Minister also said that the Government will announce a rail PPP project in the next days. The project will include the upgrade of 141 Km of rail tracks between Fray Bentos and Estación Algorta in Río Negro.