Nine years have passed since the beginning of an infrastructure project that promised to provide the
Ezeiza airport
with a key resource in terms of modernizing the operation of the international air terminal:
a new control tower
, the tallest in Latin America.
However, after all this time, the
work is unfinished
and no one can specify what will happen to it.
A new white elephant?
It is, furthermore, that type of work that is impossible to make invisible.
A mega tower
more than one hundred meters high
, imposing and with a futuristic appearance that impacts the entrance to the Ministerio Pistarini International Airport, in Ezeiza, province of Buenos Aires.
The signs of the company in charge of construction - a joint venture made up of the construction companies Niro and Riva - are no longer visible and the crown of the tower looks wrapped in scaffolding and protective nets;
without movement of personnel and workers.
The kickoff of the work took place in
January 2015,
with Mauricio Macri already in the presidency (the project and the bidding processes had begun before, during the government of Cristina Fernández).
For the last stretch of Macri's administration, there was a political decision to accelerate work on the
new departure terminal
, which, along with the tower and other infrastructure works, was part of the expansion of the airport.
Thus the tower was left aside.
Finally Macri could not inaugurate the terminal;
In September, during final work, a giant scaffold collapsed and a worker died, stopping work.
And a few months after a new change of government, the Covid pandemic occurred.
The new control tower at the Ezeiza airport, under construction for 9 years.
Photo: Matías Martín Campaya
Today the future of this work is unknown.
On the one hand, President Javier Milei was in charge of clarifying as many times as he could that
"there is no money" and that "public work is finished."
On the other hand, last week he fired the Minister of Infrastructure, Guillermo Francos, and demoted the portfolio to secretary under the wing of the Ministry of Economy, of Luis Caputo.
And the impact of what happens around public works is already being felt.
This was stated by Camarco (the Argentine Chamber of Construction), which warned of an extreme situation: "There are nearly 3,500 unfinished projects throughout the country, which put at risk the activity of the 1,400 construction companies, which employ more of 500,000 workers".
The unfinished tower
Sources from EANA (the Argentine Air Navigation Company) informed
Clarín
of the current situation: "The construction of the tower responds to a general plan for the remodeling and expansion of the airport that included different works. One of them was the departure terminal, which "It was inaugurated in April. However, work on the tower has been so delayed that it will be necessary
to readjust prices and costs
. "
In other words, in the future, the work will have to be re-tendered.
The new control tower at the Ezeiza airport, under construction for 9 years.
Photo: Matías Martín Campaya
EANA is a state company that provides navigation services and is responsible for implementing public policies for planning, direction, coordination and administration of air traffic.
This company should be the user of the tower.
At the moment they have no information about the continuity of the work.
"On the other hand, it must be taken into account that in addition to the building,
the tower has to be equipped with technology.
Defining the needs and implementation is a project in itself that could require a year of work," explained EANA.
Journalist Norberto Dupesso, accredited at the airport for more than 40 years and a specialist in aeronautical issues, understands that "many years will pass before we see this tower operational. The reality is that this project was extraordinary. It even has a futuristic appearance. The The idea was that all the air traffic controllers would work from there. And although the project looked very good, the work has been paralyzed since the previous government. Today its construction would depend on the Ministry of Economy which, honestly,
has so many emergencies that I can't imagine that can give importance to the tower".
On the other hand, he understands that Ezeiza
operates correctly with the current tower
.
"Since there is no urgency, nor a compelling need, perhaps the work will be relegated," assessed Dupesso.
The characteristics of the tower
It is a structure composed of three parts: a building located on the basement, which is called ACC (Area Control Center), a reinforced concrete shaft, and the crown, which in the future should have a completely transparent perimeter, to allow viewing of all tracks.
Elliptical plan of the tower.
The base of the tower has an elliptical plan, which visually impacts and reinforces the modern image of the work.
In addition to the technical basement - where the building's engines, pumps, tanks, panels and cooling machines are located - there are two levels of offices and control rooms for the air operation.
The end of the tower also has elliptical floor plans and a glass envelope that is
supported on a perimeter metal structure
.
Thus, operators will be located at an observation level of 80 meters and with a 360-degree field of vision.
The base, under construction.
Due to the total height of the building - 108.4 meters - the base that supports the wind load is composed of a three-meter-thick foundation plate that required more than 1,500 m3 of concrete and 200 tons of steel.
The “shaft” section of the tower – the tube, the spine –
was carried out in 23 stages
.
Its elliptical shape, with double curvature, posed a great challenge.
A huge set of inserts in which each part had a specific shape and location.
"It was necessary to have the permanent presence of a topography team, which carried out a meticulous control of each of the locations so that everything closed with the shape indicated in the three-dimensional model (which had been previously made). Each part depended on the adjacent one. , just as each stage depended on the next," they explained at the time from the Niro - Rivas UTE.
At 62 meters high of the structure, the Control Tower sector begins, which is made up of five slabs, all of different surfaces (ordered from smallest to largest).
Technical and living rooms, offices and bathrooms are distributed.
And at 80 meters high from the tower is the control room with a 360º panoramic view.
S.C.