The mountainous Route 32 to the Caribbean coast reopened over the weekend to normal traffic following an unprecedented natural disaster involving at least 40 landslides that trapped thousands of motorists for eight hours last Thursday night and Friday morning. Miraculously, no one was seriously injured.
A harrowing Thursday evening continued into early Friday morning for hundreds of motorists trapped on the Braulio Carrillo Highway that connects San José to the Caribbean port city of Limón. Heavy rains triggered multiple landslides that stranded 380 people for hours in the dark and rain.
President Luis Guillermo Solís, representing Costa Rica as the president pro tempore of the regional organization, is set to meet with the presidents of China, Brazil and Chile during the week-long event in Brasilia.
Costa Rica's lawmakers agreed to postpone until Oct. 12 discussion of a $395 million loan from the government of China to finance the expansion and renovation of Route 32, the main access highway to the province of Limón.
Public Works and Transport Minister Carlos Segnini on Thursday asked lawmakers to postpone for up to four months a final vote on a $485 million loan package from China to finance expansion of Route 32, the country’s main access to the Caribbean province of Limón.
Hundreds of Caribbean residents on Tuesday traveled from the province of Limón to San José to urge lawmakers to expedite a Chinese loan to finance the expansion of Route 32, the main highway connecting the province with the capital.
Representatives of a number of professional associations and private sector chambers expressed their concern on several technical and legal matters of the project to expand Route 32, the main access to the Caribbean, which will be financed with a loan from the government of China.
The Legislative Assembly’s Financial Affairs Commission on Thursday evening passed a bill authorizing a $465 million loan to finance the expansion of a 107-kilometer stretch of highway connecting the capital to the Caribbean province of Limón.
Limón residents angered by a delay in legislation to expand Route 32, the main highway connecting Costa Rica's capital with the Caribbean coast, descended on San José's Legislative Assembly Wednesday, and the target of their ire was Citizen Action Party lawmaker Manrique Oviedo.
