The Tram-Tiss consortium involving Bouygues, Colas, Bombardier and Veolia has won a €1.6bn contract to build a tram-train system on Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean.
The consortium includes architects and financial partners from the Island such as AXA and Société Générale.
The team will build and operate a 40km section of the coastal route linking Sante-Marie and the airport to the east of the capital Saint-Denis with Le Port and Saint-Paul in the northwest.
The line will have 28 stops, run 20 LRVs and cater to nearly 45,000 passengers daily. The 40m-long trains will accommodate 265 passengers each.
The project is being funded by a public-private partnership with €435m of state funds, €200m from the EU and from the government's economic stimulus package.
Work is expected to begin in 2010 and be finished by 2014.
The line will eventually run eastwards from Sante-Marie to Saint-André and Saint-Benoît and along the island's west and south coasts from Saint-Paul to Saint-Louis, Saint-Pierre and Saint-Joseph.
The Tram-Tiss consortium has won the project's contract from the rival Run Ram consortium led by Vinci, Alstom and Caisse des Depôts et Consignations.
