According to FCC, it is the largest international construction contract ever won by a Spanish company. The overall Riyadh metro has an estimated budget of some US$22 billion.
The consortium headed by FCC will build lines 4, 5 and 6 of the metro. FCC's main consortium partners are Korean company Samsung and French company Alstom. The other members are Strukton (The Netherlands), Freyssinet Saudi Arabia, Typsa (Spain) and Setec (France). The project will take five years, and is expected to employ 15,000 people.
The three lines will have 25 stations. Construction will include 64.6 kilometres of rail track, made up of 29.8km of viaducts, 26.6km underground and 8.2km of overground track.
The Arriyadh Development Authority (ADA) has also awarded two other contracts for the 176km metro system. Italy’s Ansaldo STS is the leader of the Arriyadh New Mobility group (ANM) which will be responsible for one line with a total distance of 40.7km. The contract is valued at US$5.21 billion.
Bechtel of the USA leads the BACS consortium which will design and build two lines with a total distance of 63.3km. The contract is valued at US$9.45 billion.
Work will begin on the design of the metro project immediately and construction will begin in the first quarter of 2014.
