The Government has committed to contributing up to 154 million euros to co-finance, together with the Madrid City Council, the second section of the undergrounding of the A-5, between Padre Piquer and Aviación avenues, a figure that in principle will represent 25% of the the project budget.
This was communicated by the Executive to the Consistory in the follow-up meeting of Operation Camp held in the Ministry of Housing and Urban Agenda, in which the Secretary of State for the branch, David Lucas, and the municipal delegate of Urban Planning, Environment, participated. Environment and Mobility, Borja Carabante.
At the meeting, both parties have reaffirmed the processing schedule agreed upon last January and, in addition, have taken a new step to make the complete burial of the A-5 practically to the limit of the capital’s municipal area a reality, a long-sought neighborhood demand.
The City Council has already launched the first section of the underground, which corresponds to the 3.9 kilometers of the highway from Paseo de Extremadura to Avenida del Padre Piquer, a project budgeted at 400 million euros that is already in tender and whose works could begin, according to Carabante, next October.
In turn, the second section of the burial crosses the land of Operation Camp, owned by the state, and the City Council had requested the collaboration of the Government to carry it out.
The lack of specificity regarding this second section had sparked several neighborhood protests in recent months, especially because the first section leaves out the 700-meter space that separates Avenida del Padre Piquer from Avenida de los Poblados.
David Lucas explained that the Ministry will contribute 154 million euros, of which 146 will be dedicated to the burial itself and the remaining eight to a new transport interchange that will be built in the area, in a location yet to be determined.
In addition, the Executive will face “fee expenses” for drafting the project for the second section of the A-5 underground.
Carabante recalled that the commitment to co-finance this project was already included in the Operation Camp agreement signed by the Ministry of Defense in 2009, and has conveyed to the neighbors “peace of mind” because what was agreed “represents the complete burying of the A- 5″.
As for the entire Operation Camp, both administrations have ratified the previously agreed schedule of actions, which means that the Government will have to present its urbanization initiative and the bases for the area’s compensation board in the summer.
“We are ready to meet the deadlines,” Lucas assured, while Carabante added that, in that case, the project would pass its first plenary session in September or October, and then be released to public information and be definitively approved “a throughout the year 2025.”
Both the Secretary of State and the councilor have agreed to maintain the objective of urbanization works starting at the end of 2025 or beginning of 2026.
Operation Camp, which concerns a former barracks area in the Latina district, will include the construction of 10,700 homes, of which 60% will have some public protection.