Revenue of Derech Eretz Highways (1997) Ltd., the franchise holder for the Yitzhak Rabin Highway (Highway No. 6, also known as the “Cross Israel Highway”), totaled NIS 306 million in 2005, the company announced today. Derech Eretz Highways recruited 100,000 new subscribers during the year, giving it a total of 500,000. 1.36 million cars traveled on the road in 2005, 24% more than in 2004.
Yehuda Wilk, CEO of Derech Eretz Highways subsidiary Derech Eretz Management Corporation, which operates and maintains the highway, and collects tolls for it, said that 295,000 of the highway’s subscribers were charged by video photographing of their vehicles, and the other were charged using a smart electronic transponder that communicates with an electronic system located at every toll gate along the highway. Derech Eretz Management stresses that subscribers made 80% of trips on the highway. There were 21 million trips on the highway in 2005, and travelers had been billed for traveling on over 100 million sections of the highway.
Wilk added that figures showed that users now had no doubts that Highway 6 was needed. Despite the positive figures reported by the company, however, the state will still have to pay Derech Eretz Highways NIS 20 million in April because of the guarantee given the franchise holder.
Derech Eretz Highways heads assert that the reason for the state’s payment is failure to develop intersecting roads in 2005. Wilk said that the company’s targets for last year assumed that intersecting roads, include Highway 471 (the Maccabit road), would be developed.
John M. Beck, chairman and CEO of Derech Eretz Highways partner Aecon Group (TSX: ARE), said that Highway 6 was the most successful toll road project his company was involved in. He added that Aecon had not become a partner in infrastructure projects in Israel because the consortium wanted to see dividends from Derech Eretz Highways’ activity first.
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on January 25, 2006