The Ministry of Public Works, Transport and Housing of the Government of the Canary Islands, led by Sebastián Franquis, has awarded the contract for 348,459 euros for the drafting of the layout and construction project for the new link between the TF-1 and the TF-2 in Santa María del Mar, as well as the completion of Section A of the Ofra-El Chorrillo highway, in the municipality of Santa Cruz de Tenerife.
The contract has been awarded to the joint venture formed by the specialized companies Novotec Consultores and Técnicas Avanzadas de la Macaronesia, which has a period of eight months to prepare the construction project, which also includes a study on the feasibility of the bridge structure half finished on the TF-5 at the height of the Hospital Universitario Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria.
The Ministry wants to have an execution project this year to immediately launch the contracting of the works for this section that would link the Príncipes de España avenue with sections B and C of Ofra-El Chorrillo, crossing the car park next to the hospital Nuestra Señora de La Candelaria, the TF-5 through an elevated structure, a viaduct over the Los Moriscos ravine and surrounding the neighborhood of Las Moraditas. As a novelty, the drafting of the project that has just been awarded includes the study to remodel the link between the TF-1 and the TF-2 at the height of Santa María del Mar.
Since 1997
With this action that has just been contracted, the Government wants to definitively promote the completion of the Ofra-El Chorrillo road, which began to be executed in 1997 and has been paralyzed on several occasions in recent years due to administrative and budgetary problems. . To achieve this, the Ministry is also preparing the tender for the execution of the works on sections B and C, which have already begun but whose work was left unfinished due to the aforementioned stoppages.
The ultimate goal, when the three sections are completed, is to open a direct connection between the TF-1, the TF-2 and the TF-5, which is expected to become the second route into the capital of Tenerife from the south since it will largely decongest the traffic load of this motorway at its entrance to the city. The calculations of the technicians are that this connection between the two highways absorbs a daily average of almost 40,000 vehicles, since it will attract a large part of the circulation of the TF-1 that wants to join the neighborhoods of the eastern area of Santa Cruz. For this reason, it is also necessary to remodel the connection between the southern motorway and the TF-2 at the height of the Santa María del Mar neighborhood.
Complexity
The drafting of the project for Section A of the Ofra-El Chorrillo road is uniquely complex as it has to overcome several considerable obstacles, such as the crossing over the TF-5 or crossing the Los Moriscos ravine. For this reason, this drafting of the project must also include a study on the feasibility and compatibility of the current structure of the existing bridge over the TF-5 at the height of the Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria University Hospital, which began to be built in 1997 and was left halfway, to correct possible defects that this construction may have.
The project to connect the TF-2 and the TF-5 with a road next to the San Matías neighborhood began to be processed in 1996, as one more work within the construction of the new Tres de Mayo avenue. However, these works were limited to raising the structure of the bridge over the TF-5 and shortly afterwards they were paralyzed.
Finally, in 2007 the regional government put out to tender a new specific project for this connection whose works began in 2008, with the layout of the road and the roundabouts, the temporary asphalting of part of it and the start of construction of the bridge over the ravine del Muerto, which was never finished. However, this project underwent several modifications that required complementary works that hampered the development of the project due to administrative problems and lack of budget, reasons that finally forced the work to stop without having been fully completed.
After these problems, the Ministry resolved the 2007 contract in 2018 and launched the administrative processing of two new contracts separated by sections: one for sections B and C and another for section A, which is more complex to execute. The first that has been processed is the contract for sections B and C, which are the most advanced due to the works carried out between 2007 and 2008.
