Transnordestina Railroad: All About!
To understand more about the history of Brazilian railroads, it is necessary to know the main railroads in the country, both those that already existed, those that exist and those that are in the process of completion. One of them is Ferrovia Transnordestina, which we'll talk about in the following article.
Content Index
Context of the emergence and history of the Transnordestina Railroad
The railroad sector started last century as the main mode of transport in the country, just as it happened in the main nations of the world.
However, due to a foreign investment policy, governments began to invest in industries in the automobile sector, causing the road sector to grow considerably, enough to become, with great advantage, the main mode of transport in the country, especially from the 60s.
In the 90's, seeing that the railroad sector was precarious and needed investments to grow, the government included this modal in the privatization plan. From then on, the main existing railroads became concessions from private companies, through auctions.
One of the projects created by the current government, even in the 1980s, was the Transnordestina railroad, which aimed to improve the exploitation of resources in the states of the Northeast.
With the construction of this railroad, it would be easier to transport inputs to the country's important ports, passing through several northeastern states, such as Piauí, Pernambuco and Ceará.
At the time, the project was less ambitious, with a projected construction of only 3 railroad sections.
Like other railroad projects and also networks that already existed, the railroad network in the Northeast is part of the privatization project, in 1997.
In this way, the Transnordestina Railroad was granted a concession for the private sector, acquired by the former Companhia Ferroviária do Nordeste S/A (CFN), which currently receives the name of Ferrovia Transnordestina Logística (FTL).
As its name already indicates, Ferrovia Transnordestina was to be the flagship of this important company in the logistics sector, which invests a lot of resources in the growth of the railroad sector in the country.
However, the project took a while to get off the ground. After this privatization process, several plans and studies had to be developed by the FTL in the early 2000s.
Thus, the Transnordestina railroad only began to be built in 2006, with a projection that could reach 1753 km in length, with the idea of connecting the Port of Pecém, in Ceará, to the Port of Suape, in Pernambuco, also passing through the cerrado of Piauí.
The project for the construction of the Transnordestina railroad had an initial budget estimated at around 5 billion reais, part of which would be paid by government funds for railroad investment and the other part taken from the FTL fund.
How is it currently?
Although it was designed to be the main railroad network in the Northeast, as it would encompass 3 of the most important states for the region's economy, with Ceará and Pernambuco being the 2nd and 3rd most populous, the Transnordestina railroad has not yet been completed, and suffers from delays in completing the work.
The initial projection was that, from the beginning of the works, in 2006, the entire route of the Transnordestina railroad would be completed by 2016, 10 years after the beginning of the construction of the railroad line.
However, until this period, the data indicated that only 52% of the works were completed, totaling 600 km in length. At the same time, the section that had already been built did not have much of a function, as the work needed to be completed for the line to follow the projected path.
After this year, the works were paralyzed for more than 3 years, as the Federal Court of Accounts vetoed the use of public resources to continue investing in the work, precisely because of the budget that had been made in the construction and that did not obtain the projected results.
Despite this, at the end of 2020, the works of the Transnordestina railroad were resumed. For it to be completed, it is estimated that an investment of more than 5 billion will be necessary, almost doubling the budget of the initial projection.
Charge transport
The initial idea was that the Transnordestina railroad would become one of the main railroads in the transport of agricultural inputs, such as grains and ores, to the ports in the Northeast region.
The FTL, for example, which is the company that manages the entire railroad in the Northeast, after obtaining the Northeast Network of the former Rede Ferroviária Federal SA, which was privatized in 1997, is responsible for the transport of more than 2 million tons of cargo, mainly cellulose, cement and fuels.
Unfortunately, these inputs are transported by the company's other railroads and in the northeast region, as currently, the Transnordestina railroad's cargo transport consists only of elements to help in the continuation of the line's work, such as crushed stone, to help with mounting of the track rails.
Importance of the Transnordestina railroad da Ferrovia Transnordestina
The Transnordestina railroad was designed to be the main railroad line in the northeast region, as it would help in the exploration of important resources for the economy of the northeastern states, mainly agriculture and mining.
In the future, it would still be an important way of interconnecting with other railroads, helping to transport production from the state to other regions of the country.
However, due to the delays that occurred in the construction of the Transnordestina railroad, which was only resumed 4 years after the year in which it should have been completed, it is still not possible to identify all the potential that the line may have.
Despite this, now that the work has resumed, there is a certain expectation by the people who were most involved to make this possible, understanding that future plans for the Transnordestina Railroad network may also become a great exponent of the rail transport modal of cargo from the region and the country.
This expectation is generated because several works in the railroad sector were resumed, and are still under construction, such as FIOL and Ferrogrão, important railroads in Brazil.
Conclusion
We can conclude from the article that, despite its importance for the exploration of mineral and agricultural resources in the northeast region, many expectations were frustrated during this process. The Transnordestina Railroad, which would be FTL's flagship, already has considerable delays in the work. Despite this, after the resumption of construction, more than 3 years after a major stoppage, there is optimism that the work will be completed in the coming years, forming this railroad that will be able to transform the flow of resources produced in the northeastern states.
Searchs:
https://www.csn.com.br/quem-somos/grupo-csn/ftl/
http://vfco.brazilia.jor.br/ferrovias/Transnordestina/TNeTransnordestina.shtml
