Contact In Brasília: Mauro Azeredo +55-61-3329-1059 E-mail: Mazeredo@worldbank.org WASHINGTON, April 8, 2008―The World Bank today approved a $95 million additional financing to the State of São Paulo, Brazil, in support of the São Paulo Metro Line 4 Project.“The Line 4 Metro Project is a pioneering public-private partnership in urban transport. It started a trend for private sector investments in the urban transport sector,” said John Briscoe, World bank Director for Brazil. “This frees the State to invest in other priority areas not as attractive to private investment, and boosts urban service delivery capacity, especially for the poor. It is a win-win situation.” The new loan will contribute to the main objectives of the project to improve the quality and long-term sustainability of urban transport in the São Paulo Metropolitan Region. The original project loan for US$209 million was signed in 2002. The project is expected to help improve the city’s serious transit congestion problem, by interconnecting the subway, commuter rail and bus networks. This will improve access to affordable transport for the low-income population. The urban poor are the main users of public transport in São Paulo and spend over a fifth of their income in fares. They also are most affected by problems such as shortage of capacity at peak hours and long journeys to and from work. “Project implementation is now proceeding well and on schedule, under the strict safeguard policies set for this kind of operation by the State,’” said Jorge Rebelo, World Bank Project Task Manager. “More than half of the works and over 70% of the institutional capacity development operations have been concluded and the lineis scheduled to start operations by end of 2009. Line 4 is expected to transport 1 million passengers per day by 2012” This $95 million IBRD loan is a fixed spread loan in US$ with a 25 year maturity and 5 years grace with Automatic Rate Fixing by period and with options for currency and interest rate conversion. . The loan will cover project costs affected by the devaluation of the US dollar vis a vis Brazil’s real. ### For more information on this project visit: http://web.worldbank.org/external/projects/main?pagePK=64283627&piPK=73230&theSitePK=40941&menuPK=228424&Projectid=P105959 For more information on the World Bank’s work in Brazil, please visit: http://www.worldbank.org/br |
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