With the purpose of strengthening citizen participation and publicizing the main challenges of public transport infrastructure in the face of the El Niño Phenomenon (FEN), the Supervisory Agency for Investment in Public Transport Infrastructure (Ositrán) held the 2026 National User Councils Meeting.
Under the motto "25 years strengthening citizen participation in public transport infrastructure," the event brought together representatives from the eight national and regional User Councils. During the meeting, the actions being developed by the Regulator in response to the 2026-2027 El Niño Phenomenon were presented, as well as the main challenges and projects related to transport infrastructure.
The inauguration was led by the Minister of Transport and Communications, José Angello Tangherlini Casal, who highlighted that Ositrán "does a very important technical job for the MTC and it is relevant to have this entity to improve the user experience in public transport infrastructures."
For her part, the president of the Ositrán Board of Directors, Verónica Zambrano Copello, presented the challenges in supervising concessioned infrastructure in the face of El Niño and specified that "supervision seeks for each actor to fulfill their corresponding role: concessionaires must maintain and operate the infrastructures, activate their response mechanisms, and restore services; while Ositrán supervises, inspects, documents, and verifies compliance with contractual obligations."
She explained that the Regulator's experience with the Coastal El Niño in 2017 and Cyclone Yaku in 2023 "has made it possible to identify the importance of strengthening prevention, having objective information on the state of the infrastructures, and timely verifying compliance with the concessionaires' obligations."
Concessionaire Companies Have Been Duly Alerted
"Based on the cases already seen, Ositrán is reinforcing a strategy based on anticipating, supervising, and accrediting. Since early 2026, we have alerted concessionaire companies to take the necessary precautions, in addition to reinforcing the presence of supervisory engineers in the concessions," Verónica Zambrano pointed out to the User Councils.
Preventive actions carried out include identifying critical points, verifying the maintenance of drains, culverts, bridges, and slopes, reviewing contingency plans, and checking the availability of personnel, equipment, and resources to attend to emergencies.
Likewise, the president of Ositrán stressed the importance of establishing more agile mechanisms to review and approve engineering projects in emergency situations, as well as ensuring contingent financing mechanisms.
The 2026 National User Councils Meeting concluded by highlighting that coordination between Ositrán, the MTC, concessionaires, and other competent entities is fundamental to respond promptly to extreme weather events and that contractual supervision is a preventive and not merely reactive tool, as it allows anticipating failures, reducing risks, and protecting the continuity of critical infrastructure for the country.
During the meeting, which was moderated by economist Roxana Barrantes, ProInversión's projects for the modernization and improvement of the Third Group of Airports were also presented, as well as progress to improve connectivity in the Huánuco and San Martín regions through Corridor Vial 4.
It is important to note that Ositrán's User Councils are spaces for citizen participation that allow users to express their needs, raise problems, and formulate proposals related to the quality and provision of services. Currently, there are eight User Councils, four national in scope—User Council for Airports, Ports, Road Network, and Railways—and four regional in scope—User Council for Arequipa, Cusco, Loreto-San Martín, and Piura—comprising a total of 63 representatives.
