TransMilenio risks stopping its activities

In a debate over the political control of TransMilenio manager Orlando Santiago Cely, councilor Diana Diago led a analysis of the management and operation of the system conclude that a budgetary investment without “effective results”.

According to Diago, the administration of the mayoress, Claudia López, failed to solve the most obvious problems of public transport three years, “today Bogota is the most congested city in Latin America and this problem is getting worse”.

In turn, the spokeswoman for the Democratic Center pointed out that TransMilenio is a “Sample of the problems that overwhelm the city”, adding that the system is dirty, cluttered and insecure.

The adviser pointed out that it is inconsistent for the administration to neglect other portfolios, such as security, allocate more than two million pesos to private operators of a system “whose citizens are deeply disappointed and do not want it.”

In this sense, Diago pointed out that citizens are not willing to fund a broken system and it does not respond to the request.

The councilor expressed concern about the future of TransMilenio and said that it is under threat due to its lack of funding, since based on a response to the political control debate proposal, a right to petition sent by the Democratic Center bench, in 2022 the national government did not transfer resources to TransMilenio:

“In 2022, no resources were received from the national government, so the district had to fully cover the system deficit that year, equivalent to $2.46 billion. It is worth saying that these resources are equivalent at 69.1% of property tax collection that yearbeing 44.3% of the ICA collection, for this reason and in the face of the current economic situation, we hope that the national government accepts the proposal to allocate resources, it being understood that this situation also affects the cities with an established public transport system”.

On this basis, Diago drew attention to the national government, pointing out that the deficit is 2.3 trillion pesos and these resources are only projected until July 2023, “So what is the national government waiting for to support mobility projects in the district? Apparently, this government cannot be trusted, as we have seen with its declarations from the Bogotá metro”.

On the other hand, the city councilor criticized the lack of planning to counter the problem of the wheels of the system. According to Diago, after three years of administration of Claudia López there is no clear picture and number of updated castings, since the only study available is from 2018 and does not include the zonal component.

“More than 50 billion pesos have been spent on burglar-proof doors that do not work properly and there is no real commitment from private operators to return part of their profits to the city and guarantee continuity and stability of the model,” he said.

Given the seriousness of the problem, Diago called on the office of the mayor of Bogotá to take effective measures to prioritize the problems of TransMilenio and a public transport service is guaranteed suitable, safe, efficient and sustainable for the people of Bogotá.

Finally, Diago announced measures against the green corridor, since for the spokesman this project is nothing more than another TransMilenio trunk for the seventh race.

“We will do everything in our power to prevent Claudia López from burying the mobility of the eastern border, to continue with her whim of filling Bogotá with buses”, concluded the city councilor.