| | |  Business News | August 2009 
Port Colonet Bidding for September
 The News
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August 18, 2009
| | Secretary of Communications and Transport Juan Molinar Horcasitas (Cuartoscuro/Guillermo Perea) | |
The construction of a giant deep-sea port on the shores of Baja California was greenlighted on Monday by secretary of Communications and Transport (SCT) Juan Molinar Horcasitas who foresees auctioning the construction contract next month.
Molinar said that the auction procedures had been changed due to adjustments forced by the current economic crisis the government is undergoing.
Nevertheless, he added, "the auctioning procedures are on and in 30 calendar days we will present a re-launched Colonet project."
The SCT secretary mentioned that four companies want the construction contract for the 5 billion dollar project which is slated to become Mexico's largest port with capacity to receive eighth generation vessels that carry up to 12,500 containers.
The bidding is for two projects, one is the port itself, and the second one a yet to-be-built railroad line that will link Colonet Bay to several U. S. border cities including Mexicali, Nogales and Ciudad Juarez.
Even though at Monday's press conference Molinar Horcasitas did not mention the companies, The News learned that those enterprises that might participate in the bidding are Hutchison Port Holdings, which already operates several ports in the nation, MTC Holdings, Ideal, Canadian Maersk Line, Dubai Ports, CMA and CGM, among other major port operators.
As for the railroad, Union Pacific, Ferromex and BNSF Railway are among the top bidders.
The port is seen as a future relief port which will get spillover cargo from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. The bidding for the port has been postponed by the SCT on several occasions but Molinar Horcasitas said this time it is for real.
Punta Colonet Bay is located 140 kilometers south of the port of Ensenada, Baja Califronia, and the land available for the facility is 2,700 hectares in size.
Residents in the still pristine bay have been waiting for the auction for three years. It had been stopped by legal conflicts with the Lobo mining company, now out of the region. |
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