City announces new date for tram completion, awaits project management bids

Cuenca’s municipal transportation department has set April 2018 as the completion date the tranvía. It is the fourth deadline to be announced since January 2015.

Tram tests on Av. Las Americas.

Mayor Marcelo Cabrera said that a new project management company, to be named July 3, will have nine months to complete the project.

The tranvía has been without a project manager since October when the Spanish company Four Rivers Consortium of Cuenca (CCRC), walked off the job in a payment dispute with the city. CCRC claimed that the city refused to pay for changes to the original work plan while the city claimed the changes were incorporated in the contract. The dispute is being mediated in a Santiago, Chile court.

According to Guillermo Argudo, city tram coordinator, the major work to be completed is the reinforcement of the Milchichig bridge near the industrial park, station construction, and track installation on Av. Las Americas near the intersections of Gran Colombia and Mariscal Lamar.

The bid deadline for the $32.2 million project is June 28, Argudo said.