On July 29, 1987, French President François Mitterrand and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher signed an agreement to build the Channel Tunnel, or Channel Tunnel, which would link the two countries. The works began in 1988 and concluded a year later than planned on May 6, 1994, when Queen Elizabeth II and Mitterrand cut the ribbon. Six years!
The infrastructure has 3 tunnels, two of them, about 7.6 meters in diameter, intended for the transport of people, vehicles and goods. The third, almost 5 meters in diameter, for maintenance operations or to be used in an emergency, all linked by 245 walkways. This meant digging a total of 153 kilometres. In total, the Channel Tunnel is 50.5 kilometers long, of which 39 are submarines.
We remember this story because, in Colombia, after more than a century of conception of the idea (1913), and 16 years of construction (began in 2005), in 2021 the 8.6-kilometre La Línea tunnel was inaugurated. And in Bogotá, according to the Urban Development Institute, IDU, the expansion of the North highway will end in June 2029. The pre-construction works will take a year and a half, and the construction will take 5.5 years. Seven years!
Works for the Coastal Protection of Cartagena in Bocagrande.
Juan Montano. TIME
(You can read: The ‘selected works’ of Iván Duque).
The work is 17.9 kilometers long, includes building two more lanes in both directions; two more exclusive to TransMilenio; 11.6 kilometers of public space and bike path in each direction, but the question that many ask themselves is why in Colombia leftovers are so much in demand?
This is just one of the concerns. Colombians also wonder about the quality of the works, because of their rapid deterioration, why the ‘repatches’ don’t work or are poorly done. Even the role of audits and the quality of our engineering are questioned.
To resolve these concerns, EL TIEMPO spoke with Fredy Alberto Reyes Lizcano, Full Professor at the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, Department of Civil Engineering, CECATA Research Group Center for Transport and Related Highways; and scam Sandra Campagnoli, Civil Engineer from the Colombian School of Engineering Julio Garavito, specialist in Soil Mechanics, in Geotechnics from the National University, professor and dean of the Civil Engineering Program, of the Master’s Degree and of the Specialization in Design, Construction and Maintenance of Roads, in the courses of Mechanics of Soils, Pavements and Materials for Roads.
‘The answer is, lack of planning in awards’
Interview with Fredy Alberto Reyes L. Full Professor Department of Engineering U. Javeria.
1. How are roads built in Bogotá and in general in the country? What are the parameters?
At the national level, the type of project depends, for example, in the concessions that have the responsibility for maintenance, they seek to do better and more durable jobs, since the requirement of the ANI, to maintain an IRI Index, International Roughness Index, ( standard for measuring the surface regularity of a road), obliges them to do so.
(Of your interest: Prosecutor’s Office orders ETCAR to comply with the ruling and remove Café del Mar from the walls).
Regarding INVÍAS freight lanes, improvements have been seen in recent years due to the implementation of standard specifications. They also have modern 2022 specifications, so what is done under this technical framework allows us to assume that it is reflected in the good quality of the roads. What could be uncertain is running on very old specs.
As for roads of governorates, mayors of very remote areas, They are the most prone to not having good qualities, due to regulations and outdated specifications, lack of adequate construction equipment and in good condition, and the work of audits.
2. Why do patching in the city deteriorate so quickly?
What happens is that a rearch is a very temporary solution and it is to give mobility, it is not a permanent solution. A re-arch can last between 6 months and 3 years, depending on the installed thickness and the local conditions of the pavement.
What is observed many times is that they make patches in rainy conditions and this is a condition that is prohibited. You might also wonder what the mix placement temperature is because many times the processes start at the correct temperature, but due to the routes of the dump trucks to do work at various points, the mix cools down.
The road maintenance unit has been doing good workmanship in patching its cargo, since they have plants and modify the asphalt mixtures with rubber that make them more durable.
Expansion of avenue 9 with 170. Bogota January 5, 2023.
MAURICE MORENO. TIME
3. What about the quality of the works?
It depends on the type of project as explained in the first question.
(We recommend: They lift the environmental alert in Bogotá and the solidarity peak and plaque returns).
4. Are there flaws in the intervention?
Something that is found in audits is that very few fractions of the specialists’ time are hired and they cannot exercise but observe very sporadic projects, especially in small works. Suddenly, in megaprojects, as there are more resources, auditing can count on acceptable times for specialists and carry out better quality control tests.
5. Why does building works take so long, comparing experiences from other countries?
The answer is a lack of planning, in awarding more attention should be paid to the performance of machinery and labor in the projects so that the schedule is more accurate, and demand that resources are in place to guarantee execution. . Many of them are contracted at the end of the year and when the contractor starts execution it may coincide with the rainy season and it would be necessary to wait until summer for it to be executed.
At the national level, there are very good yields in the concessions since they have the financial muscle to have large resources, since the interest of the concession is to start collecting tolls as soon as possible.
In works by execution by unit prices, the economic resources are not always available in a single term and the works have to be carried out in stages.
“There are more policy decisions than the technology itself”
Sandra Campagnoli, Civil Engineer Julio Garavito Colombian School of Engineering.
1. How are roads built in Bogotá and in general in the country? What are the parameters?
In the case of Bogotá, I would say that it is ‘sui generis’ because of the public service networks, the traffic jams, the obstacles to accessing the works, the hauling of materials and the disposal of surpluses. From a technical point of view, the roads in Bogotá are much more difficult when it is going to be built or intervened. And more here where each service entity works separately.
(In other news: Batteries! These are the road closures that will take place in Bogotá during March).
We have some specifications that have been updated, that is the guide and you have to comply with them. These are made with respect to the materials, the construction processes, the quantities of work, the payment units, the intervention itself, quality control within the work, etc.
2. Why do patching in the city deteriorate so quickly?
Roads and pavements are born, grow and do not reproduce, but they do die. They have a life cycle and the idea is that, as soon as a road is built, you have to keep in mind what to maintain it, do routine and periodic maintenance. If cracks appear, they must be sealed because the deterioration of pavements is exponential. That is the rule that every engineer knows: maintenance is not done when there is deterioration, it must be preventive first because it is not only corrective. This extends the life of the pavement.
Works by the IDU on 68 avenue.
Obviously if it was not built well, then it fails. Now, when the pavement has not been maintained, and the cause of its deterioration is not known, whether it was drainage, poor quality materials or aggregates, poorly compacted mixes, and the repair is simply made without attacking the origin of the problem, this is going to be presented again. It’s that simple.
3. What about the quality of the works?
We don’t have a very careful standard of those patches. For me, if all the design criteria are followed, if they are well carried out, if adequate controls are made on site of the construction processes, of the materials used, and if maintenance is complied with, The problems that will be presented to us with great occurrences will not arise.
4. Are there flaws in the intervention?
There are many factors that play there. They are not only the intervention or the contractor, there are many actors that can be the cause of these failures. I feel like there is a long way to go also research our local conditions. I speak for the academy. Serious pavement research is very difficult here (…) we are in a tropical country, very different from those with seasons. Our conditions are very peculiar like those of traffic (…) because all this varies according to the sites and with damage to the monitoring of what we call performance in pavements, how it behaves in weather conditions, traffic, materials and under that technology that was applied or with those design conditions that were considered. This has limited the development of pavements in our environment. Sometimes we go with many techniques that are possibly universally proven but in some regions do not work.
(It may interest you: ‘Works for Coastal Protection of Cartagena are at 48%’, says the Proplaya consortium).
5. Why does building works take so long, comparing experiences from other countries?
These multiple actors who are involved, above all, in urban roads complicate it. I think that we lack a little of that urgency of the delivery of the works. There is no cash flow, if the contractor is not paid and he stops the work, but everyone is eliminated. There are difficult issues that are more about politics than technology itself, because the latter does exist.
(See the complete interviews at www.motor.com.co).
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