The outgoing team of the Department of Public Works of the Government of the Canary Islands leaves with a conviction: never has progress been made as much in road projects and construction in Tenerife as in the last four years. This is endorsed by the number of projects started, promoted or completed throughout the Island throughout a term in which “get to work” has been called after a delay of 12 years, according to the calculation of the department directed by Sebastián Franquis, and which leaves, on the bell of the political relay, an iconic stamp that summarizes a legislature: the moment in which the North and the South shake hands under the Teno massif in the longest tunnel in the Canary Islands.
“I am leaving with the feeling of exhaustion, but also with the disappointment that we lacked four years to have executed and culminated what we know must be done, although I feel proud to have created a school: words are over and here it is. What counts are the facts”, summed up José Luis Delgado, General Director of Road Infrastructure of the Government of the Canary Islands, to DIARIO DE AVISOS, who was in favor of setting the bar for the demands of the rulers “on the results and not on the infographics”. .
With a reputation among his team for having all the works in his head, the regional head of road works in recent years has applied a recipe that has been infallible throughout the legislature that has just ended: control the monthly certifications of all contractors to the Ministry and demand that the deadlines are met. “I come from the sector and for this to work you have to be on top,” he repeats.
“We have cleared the way so that everyone is clear about what needs to be done, but there is a long way to go, although, as I said this week in Erjos, there is already light at the end of the tunnel,” said Delgado. Now he trusts that the next team of the Ministry will continue the task started in 2019: “It is hard for me to think that someone can put a stop to this, the only stop is that there is no money to carry out all the works, but that is another fight”.
Adam Martin
Its roadmap has been marked by the planning carried out by the former president of the Tenerife Cabildo and the Government of the Canary Islands, Adán Martín, embodied in the Transcanaria Transport Network, a document approved by the Parliament of the Canary Islands in 2007, which among its objectives included “guaranteeing the mobility of people and goods at the lowest possible cost and in the shortest possible time, as well as promoting public transport with the utmost respect for the environment”.
“Adán Martín was a brilliant person when it came to planning. He was the author of an extraordinary document that I discovered when I arrived at the Cabildo and that throughout my professional life in politics I have fought for it to be applied, ”says Delgado. The general director of Road Infrastructure highlights that, while the rest of the islands have developed a large part of the content of the Transcanaria Transport Network, in Tenerife it has only been reflected in two actions: the Icod de los Vinos-El Tanque and Santiago road sections from Teide-Adeje.
“In these four years I have dedicated myself to taking out the remaining actions, trying to recover what should have been done since 2007 so as not to see ourselves in the current situation of circulatory chaos. That is the problem of Tenerife: we are 12 years behind”.
José Luis Delgado reviewed for the readers of DIARIO DE AVISOS the current status and forecasts of the works included in the document endorsed 16 years ago by the Parliament of the Canary Islands, after underlining one of the phrases that is usually commented on in the world of engineering and that, he confesses, is very present in his day to day: “Great works are thought up by geniuses, built by fighters, enjoyed by the happy and criticized by the chronically useless”.
Status of works in progress
-Circunvalación de La Laguna: “It is the work in which we have been most involved. Although Adán Martín’s project included the leg of the external road, we have focused exclusively on promoting the ring road, which passes behind the airport and connects with the TF-13”. The project includes a six-kilometre tunnel, which would exceed the Erjos tunnel, the largest in the Canary Islands, and which would connect with Guamasa. “I would like to put that project up for bid before I leave. It already has the favorable environmental report and the approval of all administrations. On July 10 it has to be delivered, approved and put out to tender”.
-Mesa Mota Tunnel: “It will connect the area of Bajamar, Punta del Hidalgo and Tegueste directly with the TF-13 without having to go up to Las Canteras. It is a work that has all the congratulations and is pending the supervision report to put it out to tender. It is the most important project in the last 40 years in the northeast of the island. After the Tejina bypass, not a single road infrastructure of regional interest has been built in this area. That road supports a traffic of 22,000 vehicles a day and it is chaos”.
-Third bus-vao lane between La Orotava and Guamasa: “The project is currently on public display, the allegations have already been reported and right now it is pending the approval of the environmental procedure. I estimate that in a couple of months the environmental report will have been issued and from there the construction project will take place, which may take two years to complete”. He admits that it is a “very complicated” work.
-Section San Juan de la Rambla-Icod: “It already has favorable environmental and supervision reports and the construction project is finished pending final approval to put it out to tender. I would like to leave that project awarded so that the Government that enters now only has to bid and award.”
-Erjos Tunnel, central work of closing the Island Ring: “We left it in a very advanced state. In theory, after this week’s draft, this section should come into service in 15 months, therefore, if the forecasts are met, it will begin to circulate in November 2024, which will relieve congestion on the Northern highway (TF-5 ), since 30,000 vehicles that now go daily to La Laguna will go from the west to the South”.
-Second road between Santiago del Teide and Erques: “The project has already been sent to the Processing of Public and Environmental Information; It should go out to tender within a maximum period of six months.”
-Fañabé-Las Américas section: “The project has been awarded, although there is an open dispute between the company that came first and the second. The Court of Contracts will decide who is right. We are solely and exclusively awaiting a report that the court has requested to make a decision. The work, which includes a false tunnel on the TF-1, accumulates a delay of six months, since it should have started in January of this year.
-Section from Playa de Las Américas to San Isidro: “It is divided into two parts. On the one hand, Playa de Las Américas-Oroteanda, whose construction project has already been delivered and is now in the supervision phase. Once passed, it will be approved and should be put out to tender within a month. We have included a new direct connection to the Hospital del Sur from the southwest area (Santiago del Teide, Guía and Adeje). And, on the other hand, there is the Las Chafiras-San Isidro project, which should also be put out to tender within a month. These two sections are relatively simple and quick works because what will be done is add a third lane on each of the two sides”.
-Third lane San Isidro-Valle de Güímar: “The project has already been awarded, although not delivered, and its drafting period is 18 months. It is a very complicated work, since all the bridges on the TF-1 motorway between San Isidro and the Güímar Valley must be demolished because there is no room for a third lane. The motorway dates from 1974, they made it for a single carriageway, then it was extended to two and right now the third one no longer fits, so the bridges have to be pulled down and new ones built. It is a huge work and, honestly, it does not currently seem like a priority to us from the point of view of mobility”.
-Icod-El Tanque and Los Realejos-San Juan de la Rambla: The chapter on priority works is completed with the section between Icod de los Vinos and El Tanque, already finished and in service, and the Los Realejos-San Juan de la Rambla section, which, by crossing an environmental protection zone that forms part of the Natura 2000 Network, has been left on hold.
