The Route of the Sun

Six Linden Comansa tower cranes have been put to work on the construction of the Route of the Sun, a major road in Colombia.

The road is part of a project by the Colombian Government to improve the country’s infrastructure. It includes 11 roads to be developed.

The Route of the Sun is 1,071 km long and will connect the capital, Bogota, with Barranquilla, one of the main ports in the Caribbean, a company spokesperson said. The project is expected to cost more than US$ 2,500 million.

Working on site is an 18 tonne capacity Linden Comansa 21LC400 tower crane, two 18 tonne capacity 21LC210s, a 5 tonne capacity LC5211 and an 8 tonne capacity 10LC140. The tower cranes are helping with the installation of seven bridges along Section 1 of the road, which crosses part of the Andes. They are being operated by Gigacon, Linden Comansa’s official distributor in Colombia.

The main contractor for Section 1 is Helios Consortium, a company formed by CAS, IECSA, ConConcreto and CSS Constructores. Section 1 is 78 km long and will include 3 km of tunnels and 6 km of bridge and viaducts. Challenges during this part of the project include mountains, rivers, gorges and average temperatures of 32 degrees Celsius.

Fabio Cañón, sales and technical director at Gigacon, said, "One of the biggest difficulties we have faced was the transportation to the rural area of the Magdalena Medio, which is crossed by this Sector 1 of the Route of the Sun.

“For the erection of the crane we couldn’t count with heavy mobile cranes but, thanks to the lightweight of the tower crane’s sections, we were able to erect them, spending a little more time than the usual.”

Due to the location of the project Gigacon has a permanent maintenance team at the jobsite for electrical, mechanical or equipment maintenance problems, a company spokesperson added.