Salini Impregilo Chile metro contract cancelled

A major part of a contract gained by the Metro 6 limited consortium to develop the Santiago Metro in Chile has been cancelled by its managers over construction delays.

The deal, worth US $160 million (€125 million), had been led by Italian-firm Salini Impregilo to take on construction of Line 6 - involving building six new stations and 7.6km of excavation works.

Once complete, the section would have served 870,000 residents in eight districts as part of an overall scheme which has been schedule to include a total of 108 stations and five lines.

Work on Line 6 began in March last year, but metro bosses have confirmed it has scrapped the contract, citing failure to meet technical terms of the agreement and setbacks to its timetable.

Consequently, the work on Line 6 – which was said to be 58% complete and required less than 40 metres of key tunnelling to finish, has been appointed to another contractor.

Responding to the situation, Salini Impregilo described the move to cancel the works as being “totally unjustified.”

The company stated it had experienced delays because of two major factors – archaeological restrictions and geological conditions on the route. These had caused unavoidable stoppages in addition to measures that were required to ensure the safety of a workforce that has included 1,100 employees.

The Italian business added that the issue is being examined by an independent adjudicator and hoped that the decision to cancel the contract would be reversed.