More tolls and electronics: highways raise fares and eliminate cabins

The Paseo del Bajo, which will connect the Buenos Aires-La Plata highway to the Illia, will be inaugurated mid-year and will be managed by AUSA. AUBASA rebuilt the roads on Route 2 and laid a bridge on the 11th of Las Víboras stream.

Tolling companies operating as road concessionaires in Argentina are going through a phase of profound reconversion. At the same time, they allocate their own resources and state funds for the improvement of roads and roads during the previous electoral campaign, which will require the cutting of magnetic tapes for the inauguration of completed works., the sector has embarked on the race for technological adaptation under the imperative of ensuring a satisfactory experience transit for users.

Jorge Alves, director of Caminos de las Sierras, concessionaire of access to the city of Córdoba, says that the provincial firm has 100% of its automatic means "With intelligent patent reader system"Our toll operation is no longer done entirely with the help of a chip or sticky devices to the windshield of cars," he said. "This forces us to reduce staff in our toll booths." Asked about the possibility of trade union disputes, he replied to his refusal: "Fortunately, we have been facing this problem for over two years and the union is very open and even proposed what we do." .

With the administration of about 700 kilometers, Caminos de las Sierras has signed an agreement to reconvert work. "As a society, this has allowed us to significantly improve the provision of parallel servicessuch as education in emergency, road safety or road safety, "said Alves, adding," We guarantee the source of work in exchange for training. "

(Also read: Who is responsible for the destruction of the Córdoba-Rosario highway)

Autopistas Urbanas SA (AUSA), a company from the city of Buenos Aires, faces a similar moment. "We are moving to a process of transformation following the change of toll stations into intelligent highways", illustrate from AUSA. As they say, soon there will be more ATMs on the toll roads and the payment will be made via portals that will read the patents and allow cars not to stop or slow down. .

In the two-lane concessionary company in Buenos Aires, some 550 people are distributed in their jobs, ranging from turnkeepers and supervisors to counting, auxiliaries, toll control and signaling. AUSA argues that cashiers would move into areas such as "patent validation, customer service, billing, trace maintenance, buildings and green spaces, monitoring, control of operations, collections, electrical maintenance and electronics ".

(Read also: Internal in Change: Tolls at the sight)

In Autopistas of Buenos Aires SA (AUBASA), representatives of the State of Buenos Aires, the spokespersons of its president, Víctor El Kbadir, explain that since the change of government in 2015, the company has become "a balanced business in financial matters resulting of austere and efficient administration ". "The incorporation of staff is provided once AUBASA will have ensured the maintenance, administration and operation of Provincial Highway 6", refer to that which unites Zárate to La Plata.

For 2019-2020, the concessionaire of the Buenos Aires-La Plata highway plans to undertake a work plan that will require an investment of more than $ 1,000 million. The figure includes the City Bell connection, with about 570 million; repairing both hands in the La Plata-Hudson section for 200 million; the valuation of the descent of Quilmes by 100 million; the resurfacing of Provincial Road 63, between 10 and 20 kilometers per 100 million; the same for 13 kilometers of the 2 by 300 million and the 11 by 100 million.

Córdoba At the head of the Caminos de las Sierras, Alves is proud to mention that the bypbad works, which reach 17 kilometers with three lanes in the direction of traffic, with tunnels, bridges and trenches, have entered the D & D zone. # 39; culmination. "Almost all of 2019, we will focus on the completion of the third lane 40 kilometers from the Avenue, but we will also end with Highway 38 towards Punilla Valley, in Lake San Roque., although the first stage is completed in April and the province is thinking about continuity until Cosquín ", graph.

AUSA commissioned a study from an external consultant to determine the conditions of service, safety and comfort on each of the highways and, through these recommendations, work plans were prepared for each of the route plans: resurfacing, horizontal demarcation, improvement of defenses and roads, among others. Electrical maintenance tasks and improvements are also carried out in properties located under highways.

Before the delicate question about the cost of tolls, Alves recognizes that, thanks to their tariff tables, it is "good to maintain the power of purchasing the collection". "When the government of Juan Carlos Schiaretti took office, our goal was to value this company, a privately owned, privately owned company, which was bankrupt and we had to leave this competition and pay the remaining debt of that company. contest. ", evokes the distance, and states that" from there, all financial engineering has been put in place to make it sustainable ".

AUBASA proposes a 33% average rate update for the Buenos Aires-La Plata highway and the Atlantic corridor (routes 2 and 11). The Ministry of Infrastructure of Buenos Aires organized public hearings on March 19 and 20. AUBASA specifies that "has the lowest rate per kilometer in the urban access network to the city of Buenos Aires". The other accesses (north and west) are in the hands of Abertis (Spanish company Florentino Pérez, president of Real Madrid and Benetton family) and they had the Macri as minority shareholders until 2017.

In the zone of greatest economic release of the country, AUSA accuses the cimbronazo of the inflation. "One of the biggest impacts was the workforce, with workers having an increase of 36.3% until November 2018," they said. . But sand, concrete and cement, the main elements of the works, have increased further, up to 86% in 2018, and drives up the price of asphalt. Even with the willingness to offer those who take more and more agile, safe and user-friendly routes, it's not always so easy to find your way.

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