The Metrobus on 9 de Julio (Photo: Télam)
Two Metrobus stops that were built in Pompeya last year at a cost of $4m will be taken down to make way for a new transfer station.
The Buenos Aires City government has been criticised by the opposition for its lack of planning, as the case was compared to the demolition last year of a boulevard on Av. Cabildo which had cost $5m to build and had not yet been inaugurated, to make way for a new Metrobus.
The government “demolished the boulevards on Av. Cabildo, recently built, and they now have to dismantle the bus stops that are less than a year old,” said one of the City’s general auditors, Facundo Del Gaiso, of Coalición Cívica. “As a conclusion, we can affirm that it’s a masterpiece of horrific urban planning, and it shows the inefficiency [of the government] when it comes to administering the state’s resources.”
The same company that built the bus stands last year at a cost of $2m each, will now be in charge of taking them down and building the new transfer station on Av. Sáenz, which will connect Metrobus Sur (the corridor that links Constitución with Puente La Noria) with the subte‘s H line. The stops will be used in a future Metrobus.
Cristina García, of the Confianza Pública party, said that the city’s Transport Secretary Guillermo Dietrich will visit the Legislature today. “One of the questions we will ask him is precisely why they want to take down the bus stands in Pompeya and why there isn’t more coordination between ministeries.”
PSA-UNEN legislator Virginia González Gass complained about the way projects are carried out by the city government, saying: “They constantly do and undo, without a serious and systematic analysis. It’s all trial and error, and the worst part is that it’s done with public funds.”
This is not the first time the new bus system has come under scrutiny. Last year, the construction of the Metrobus on 9 de Julio sparked a series of protests regarding its environmental impact, costs, and its effectiveness to solve traffic congestion. The works went ahead and the Metrobus started operating on 24th July 2013. In October 2013, Mayor Mauricio Macri announced the construction of three new Metrobus corridors, adding to the ones on Juan B. Justo, 9 de Julio, and the south of the City.
The post Two New Metrobus Stations to be Dismantled appeared first on The Argentina Independent.