Lula inaugurates Santos-Guarujá tunnel project

The president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) participated this Friday (2.Feb.2024) in the launch of the Santos-Guarujá tunnel project. The work on the first submerged structure in Latin America is budgeted at R$5.8 billion and will be made possible through a PPP (Public-Private Partnership). The tunnel will be 21 meters deep and 860 meters long between the banks of the canal. It is the biggest work of the New PAC (Growth Acceleration Program).

According to the most recent schedule of APS (Santos Port Authority), the notice to attract a private partner will be launched in September this year. The auction at B3 (São Paulo Stock Exchange) is scheduled for November 20, 2024, with the signing of the contract on December 15. This schedule may change.

The construction of a connection between the Port of Santos and the city of Guarujá has been debated since 1927. Several projects have already been presented to shorten the distance between the cities, from bridges to tunnels in various locations. The submerged tunnel model was presented in 1997.

The last step towards launching the project was modeling the enterprise. The governor Tarcísio de Freitas (Republicans) advocated that the project take place in the form of a PPP, while the federal government preferred to make a 100% public investment to maintain control of operations in the port region.

There was also disagreement over resources for the work. Both governments were interested in financing the project. Initially, state resources were left out, but a meeting between Lula and Tarcísio on Tuesday (January 30) confirmed that the work will be divided equally.

According to the Power360the stitching was mediated by the Minister of Ports and Airports, Silvio Costa Filhowho is from the same party as Tarcísio.

Currently, drivers who need to travel from Santos to Guarujá face queues of up to 5 hours to travel by ferry, which has a daily flow of up to 40,000 vehicles. Another option is to travel along the state highway SP-055, which goes around the estuary and is 43 km long. With the tunnel, the journey will be just 1.7 km.

According to APS, the highway crossing takes an average of 1 hour, while the ferry trip varies from 18 to 60 minutes. The tunnel reduces this time to 1 minute and 42 seconds.

Participating in the project launch were:

• President of the Republic, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT);
• governor of São Paulo, Tarcísio de Freitas (Republicans);
• Minister of Development and Industry and Vice-President of the Republic, Geraldo Alckmin (PSB);
• finance Minister, Fernando Haddad;
• Minister of Ports and Airports, Silvio Costa Filho;
• Minister of the Civil House, Rui Costa;
• Minister of Institutional Relations, Alexandre Padilha;
• Minister of Entrepreneurship, Microenterprise and Small Business, Márcio França;
• mayor of Santos, Rogério Santos (Republicans);
• mayor of Guarujá, Valter Suman (PSB);
• congressperson Marcos Pereira (Republicanos-SP);
• president of APS, Anderson Pomini.