France's Vinci officially offers to construct metro tunnel

CAIRO - 19 November 2018: A group of French companies officially has presented a technical and financial offer to the National Authority of Tunnels (NAT) to build the underground part of metro project leading to Cairo Airport, according to a Sunday statement.

The offer includes a soft loan of 300 million euro from France, Tarek Aboul Wafa, head of the Central Administration of Planning at NAT, told Egypt Today.

The total cost would correspond to the prices of 2014, when the same group executed part of Phase 4 of Line 3 from Haroun Station until Nozha Station in Heliopolis.

The group has requested five years to finish the project, but NAT would not accept duration longer than three years including the time needed for studies and design, Aboul Wafa said, adding that the decision will be made by the end of 2018.

About Wafa explained that the government had planned the construction to begin at the beginning of 2019, but the date was postponed because the French group was late in delivering its official offer.

The French group, however, has the edge of having its giant excavator in Egypt already after having finished the 2014 project recently, otherwise Cairo would purchase and ship another excavator, costing million of Egyptian pounds.

The tunnel to be established by the group, led by Vinci Construction, constitutes a part of Phase 4 of the Metro Line 3. It stretches over 6.65 kilometers from Heliopolis Station to the airport with five tunnel stations. The entire Line 3 will be the Middle East’s longest with 48 kilometers.