Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Thanks for being here for this presentation of the annual results of Eiffage. I'll get back to the highlights of this period that I'll complete with the figures for the fiscal 2020 figures. Christian will present you the figures of 2019. Globally speaking, we are online with June 30. 2019 will remain a very good year for the group. Our builder concessionaire model showed how relevant it is with beautiful successes in works and in concessions. Those success of 2019 and of beginning 2020 will represent EUR 1.4 billion investment implement by works and are still not yet integrated in our book of orders. Regarding the highlights in works, the traction is still there since the growth is about 10% for the second consecutive year.
We command ourselves that the internal growth be the first engine of the growth of the group in works. Concession side, this year will remain highlighted by the several successes. They are the outcome of several years of work. According to our strategy, this development of our concessions is done in the territories in which we are really set in a sustainable way. Echo of the presentation of last year, I'll get back to some highlights of deployment rolling out of our low -carbon strategy. Regarding the works, how not to mention the ramping up of all our projects on the Grand Paris Express that you see here on screen? We have currently over 2,500 employees involved on the various projects. On the ground line 16.1, this was a year of foundation works.
It's the tunnel borers that are moving forward in parallel of the civil engineering of all the works. Armelle, the first tunnel borer, left Aulnay and dug already 400 meters. Since the Verdun station that you see on screen, three tunnel borers will operate. The first, named Bantan, will start to dig mid-March. The second, Inès, four weeks later. Dorine will be installed in the same pit this summer, while the two other tunnel borers will be in service operating. Three tunnel borers that will work and evacuate landfill from the same pit. A configuration that I've never met, even in the major infrastructure projects in Asia. On line 15 south, lot T2B, inception and first two tunnel borers, Camille and Aïcha, started to work in October, in December. They are now digging. Lot 14 north is totally completed.
South tunnel borer Claire has already trod 1.3 kilometers and is digging 35 meters a day in direction of the Orly Airport. On the Éole project, we started the tunnel works. Virginia, who dug 1.4 kilometers, went through the River Seine and is currently in Neuilly. We laid the bowstring on the Bezons bridge. The works of the Grand Paris Express, as you know, are works of roads and catenaries on the Éole line. We started in Nanterre on the new part outside of the operated railroad, and we went on with the reshuffling of the tracks on the operated networks. Eiffage Énergie Systèmes started on high- and low -voltage systems networks. We are also working on several other lots of the Charles de Gaulle Express, which started the works on the tracks on the operated network until 2024.
100,000 of hours have been already done in 2019. Beyond the Grand Paris Express, another large project is underway. The railway tunnel Lyon-Turin. Our teams implement in September the first boring work. It's nine kilometers of tunnel that are implemented traditionally and through tunnel borers. Many other lots are being expecting the call for tender. We are glad to be fully involved in the preparation of Olympic Games in Paris in four years from now. With all the lots of the Grand Paris Express and the Athletes Village that you see here on screen, won by our teams last year. A marvelous challenge that we must absolutely fulfill. Another very large project is really occupying our energy systems. The ultimate diesel backups for 36 lots that we're making in the framework of the post-Fukushima program. It's 31 ultimate diesel backups that were transferred to the operators of EDF.
We have been earmarked for the implementation of the first offshore windmill park in Saint-Nazaire for a global amount of EUR 500 million with our partner DEME. We're very present in this market in Northern Europe and United Kingdom. Eiffage Métal is a reference. The group will develop its know-how now in France. Our teams started the sales of the first housing units in the eco-neighborhood of Châtenay-Malabry. As of February 14, 60% of reservations of the six programs. This major program of urban design is very promising for the group. All of our business lines deliver the best of their know-how so as to make it a real proof of concept of the sustainable city. Eiffage Immobilier implements, again, a record sale of housing units with 5,095 units. On-screen, the Atlantis Heart in Massy.
Eiffage Immobilier continues its progression, really reaffirming its position in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Poland, and also in Switzerland. The dynamic of our property isn't limited to housing units. We have marvelous tertiary operations in offices and hotels, representing 30% of our sales in property. In our development close to the Grand Stade of Lille, we delivered the regional headquarters of Orange on here on-screen. The motorway activity experienced a strong growth, especially due to the pre-election environment. Beyond the volumes, our motorway teams illustrate themselves in terms of low -carbon innovative products and prepare themselves for the change of their business, integrating the road as a main channel of connection.
Our program of R&D I-Street development has many innovations due to Eiffage Route, Eiffage Énergie Systèmes, motorway concessions, and sustainable development. On-screen, two innovations showing the change of the motorway products towards the lower carbon.
Recytal-RM, laureate of a call for projects of the Committee for Road Innovation En Route 2017. Biophalt, the vegetal recycled coating laureate of 2019. We laid the first, not cornerstone, but the first plank of the housing building in wood, Hyperion Bordeaux. This project is at the core of the low-carbon system process of Eiffage. It's going to be the highest housing tower ever built in France. A special mention for Goyer, who made a fantastic year in France and in Poland, becoming one of the unavoidable specialists of the facades. From left to right, Orange Campus in Lyon, Pascal Tower in Puteaux, and the Warsaw Hub Tower in Poland. Internationally, Eiffage Energía implemented, in 2019, the equivalent of three solar farms of the size of Cestas, i.e., 900 MW installed. On-screen, Torres de Cotillas central power plant, solar power plant.
Our Eiffage Métal teams in Spain go on manufacturing endlessly in our Albacete factory, wind turbine stands used by our customers all around the world. Construction goes on being very dynamic in Benelux. On-screen, the projects of the future headquarter of BNP Paribas Fortis in the center of Brussels. In the Netherlands, we have delivered a pharmaceutical laboratory, a turnkey, to Kropman, thanks to its recognized know-how in the area of white rooms. In Senegal, a magnificent example of sustainable implementation where all of our teams in Senegal maintain a goodwill activity in the country and are a major asset to roll out our know-how when major structuring projects are on the table. For one of their Spanish customers, our teams of Eiffage Energía , associated with Senegalese teams to implement the wind farm of Taiba Ndiaye integrated this week, 159 megawatts on 37 kilometers.
2019 was devoted to the preparation of the project Greater Tortue Ahmeyim, transport the project between Senegal and Mauritania for BP. Two highlights, development of a yard of 12 hectares in the Port of Dakar, as you see on-screen. To implement the 21 caissons for the wave breaker. Opening of the quarries in Mauritania that will produce the bedrock necessary for the implementation of the submarine embankment. In Germany, we commissioned the Hochmosel Bridge, a major part of the Route B50, making a direct link with the Port of Antwerp. Regarding the concessions, before getting back to the five major elements of the year, some more current elements. We have acquired nine micro power plants, hydroelectrical power plants, in the southwest of France. Works, we will make compliant the renewal and the increase of the power of those power plants and the building of a new power plant in Dordogne.
We'll also be in charge of the operation and maintenance of those power plants. This project is increasing our positioning on the renewable energy sector. After over three years of work and negotiation, we secured seven years and four months of extension of the duration of the concession of the tunnel Prado-Carénage in Marseille, in exchange of the implementation of the connecting road, Schloesing. We commissioned the new part of the road, 33 km, twice two parts between Pastetten and Heldenstein of the A94 in Germany. This is a partnership contract, public-private of 30 years, including maintenance and operation of the 77 km of the road. As I said in my introduction, from this year, we'll take out five major successes, perfectly online with our strategic plan of 2016, enabling us to make the difference and to extend our portfolio of concessions at the heart of our territories.
First, the strengthening in the capital of APRR will hold 52% as compared to 50% currently. You often ask me the question about our potential strengthening when we sold the Macquarie funds. When the sale was total, the governments on FRE gave us a central role without saying a word about the reputation of our teams or the excellency of their management. We could negotiate this operation in good conditions, and we'll go on managing and deliver our know-how for the duration of the concession. We will soon sign a concession contract of the road Centre Europe Atlantique. Commission is foreseen for March. Project is about the widening and the compliance of the RN 79 between Cézéré in the Allier region and Digoin in the Saône-et-Loire département. This will be the major reference in terms of free-flow in France. It was a major target for Eiffage and APRR.
It's a greenfield construction, which is the model we prefer, because it allies very important investments of works and a good knowledge of traffic. We are in compliance with the APRR network that will operate immediately as of March. Finally, with a span of 48 years of concession, it's going to be the longest one of our portfolio after Millau. Let's remain on the motorway with the good news of this beginning of the year, where we won in a grouping the public-private partnership of 30 years for the motorway A3, the most important PPP of infrastructure ever implemented in Germany. I talked to you about it for the first time two years ago. It's about the widening from four to six ways and the operation maintenance of a section of 76 kilometers. Works will mobilize the teams of our German entities alongside our partner, the Bunte company, in Bavaria.
The works contract is close to EUR 1.5 billion that will be performed 50/50. We have all the skills to come up with this PPP, given our experience on the A94. It's an ambitious project; it is at our scale. It will mobilize about EUR 50 million of share capital and EUR 850 million of debt and EUR 700 million of subsidies. According to our strategic plan and following a work of understanding and preparation of several years, we materialized our first success of PSD for the airport in the region of Les Hauts-de-France, where all our lines of business are present for quite a long time. We have been appointed concessionaire with Aéroport Marseille Provence of the Lille Airport for a duration of 20 years as of January 1st, 2020.
The project includes renovation works, extension of the existing terminal to improve the welcoming condition of the customers, and support the development of the platform. The concessionaire will have to work on the operation, maintenance, and operation of the airport. The sales, the revenues of 29 were EUR 32 million, and the EBITDA, EUR 7 million. Finally, we seized the opportunity of the sale of the 49.99% held by Casil in the Toulouse-Blagnac Airport to secure a concession with an end in 2046 in Occitanie, but also a heavyweight reference in the management of an airport of a platform of 10 million passengers per year in acquisition for an amount of EUR 502 million. Co-shareholder CCI, Toulouse Métropole, the region Occitanie, and the French state. Sales in 2019: EUR 161 million in EBITDA, EUR 62 million.
As you see, the five last major changes in concessions are fully in line of what we have told you in 2016 in our strategic plan. As to renew our portfolio concessions while remaining on the territories where we are very present. Following those highlights of the year, I wish to get back with you on our low -carbon strategy that I've presented in detail last August. In 2019, we started an ambitious policy to highlight the sensitivity of the company to the challenges of the carbon footprint. Low carbon construction is an opportunity to make the difference on the one side, on being proactive to significantly reduce our own carbon footprint, and also by innovating even more so to support our clients in their own process of reduction of their carbon footprint.
By using the various levers of this policy, 2019 will be highlighted by the improvement of two notches by our rating Carbon Disclosure Project, decrease of the carbon intensity of the group, and refinancing of the banking facilities, EUR 2 billion at Eiffage and EUR 3 billion at APRR and Eiffage, and the cost is partly a function of the performance on two criteria, society and environment. In April 2020, we shall publish our first climate carbon report according to the reference TCFD. In open innovation, we implemented with Impulse Partners, the first French platform devoted to materials and processes low carbon that we have named Sekoya. Since June 2019, seven representative partners of all of the value chain of building and construction joined the initiative so as to deliver their expertise in terms of carbon and improve the implementation of decarbonated solutions.
The first call for solutions was inviting startups, SMIs, SMEs, and ETIs to candidate around six topics: new mobilities; design and implementation; low carbon; circular economy; biodiversity; environmental engineering, methods, tools, renewable energies and energy performance. Within a quarter, 57 solutions were proposed through the platform online, 10 preselected candidates, and five laureates. Sekoya, various different members of the club, wishes to support the designers in an implementation at a larger scale, enabling them to integrate future call for tenders. Convinced by the necessity to reduce significantly the emission of CO₂ when we evacuate the landfills of 61, we have a partnership with Volvo to buy a fleet of lorries working on LNG. On our motorways in France, we have 12 high -power stations and 17 very high -power stations.
Within two years, we'll multiply by four the amount of very high -power stations, and eventually, more than 80% of the servicing areas of the networks will be equipped. After this survey of our highlights and our low carbon strategy, let's move to our figures. 2019 can be summarized in a revenue growth of 9.4% driven by the works, an increase of our operational profit in current activities of 8% stronger than the works, supported by the volume of business. An increase of the net profit by 15.3% to the level of EUR 725 million, a good position of the WCR2019 has been a specifically good year because we materialized EUR 566 million of external growth, EUR 502 million for the Toulouse Airport.
Finally, the order intake was very sustained, and our order book is at EUR 14.2 billion, growth of 2% year-over-year in spite of the strong increase of our activity. This order book makes us anticipate a growth of the activity more limited in works and a progress of the revenues for 2020. We will hence suggest to the General Assembly to put the dividend at EUR 2.80, an increase of 16.7%. Thank you for your attention, and I invite Christian to give you the explanation and details of the financial elements.
Good evening, everyone. As usual, we shall go through the numbers, starting with revenue. This year, we have a 9.4% increase in revenue that's evenly distributed between France, 9.2%, and international, 10 plus 3% growth. Revenue now stands at EUR 18.1 billion. You may remember that it was only EUR 14 billion back three years ago; that's a EUR 4 billion increase in a matter of three years. Over the year 2019, what should be pointed out is that while increase in revenue is similar to that of last year, last year was 9.5%, there's a different explanation this time around. In 2018, we had a 5.6% increase in concessions compared to 2.9% this year. In contracting work, we had a more external growth, 5% compared to 2% this year.
The key item there, of course, is organic growth in the contracting business, and I will get back to the underlying trends. In geographic terms, we have 31% of contracting revenue international because we have an even distribution between France and the rest of the world. You will find that most of the business now, the significant business, is in three major countries that generate anywhere between EUR 800 million and EUR 1 billion in annual revenues. You have Germany and Belgium just like last year. Spain, this time around, enjoys significant development in 2019. Operating profit from ordinary operations was up 8%. You may remember that we had an 11.7% increase last year, 12%—excuse me, 7% —last year. 90 basis points in the concession business.
If you have contracting plus concessions together, there is a significant improvement in the contribution to operating profit, EUR 69 million in concessions and EUR 79 million in the holding and contracting business. You have, again, a good, even balance, but you can see that both concession and contracting have seen their profitability improve. Looking at the details of each of the branches, you first have a good performance of the property development business, almost EUR 1 billion in revenue, up 16.5%. Less so in the building business as such. We have 3.4% on works alone. You may remember that in France, we were down 5.6% in 2018, so we're back to the levels we were at in 2017. The biggest market outside France was Belgium. We have a slight growth, but the basis of comparison was quite high back then. Now we have EUR 600 million there.
Property development also had a remarkable year. EUR 76 million in profit from ordinary operations. Operating profit from ordinary operations. You have, of course, the builder/developer model is extremely favorable here because, of course, we have a set price on construction work but also on the timetable, which is, of course, essential when there's high tension on both resources and construction costs. Of course, we have fine work conducted by Eiffage Immobilier on works as such. This was a more challenging year. There was a scissors effect that I just mentioned, 2017-2019. The profit margin is down and stands at 3.7%. We have an example here of a construction site in Avenue Marceau, 10,000 square meters. We are renovating a building there. Infrastructure is enjoying good momentum, up 20%. The roadwork market has always been buoyant in pre-election periods, and roadworks became more profitable in 2019.
Of course, companies are very much present on the Grand Paris Express projects. We're looking at EUR 700 million in revenue, EUR 698 specifically. Of course, that explains the higher profit margin and income in that branch, in that business unit. We have a strong presence in Germany and Spain with sustained business. Outside Europe, Senegal is the main driver here. We're looking at EUR 220 million if you look at the agencies and the major sites. This is a record for Senegal. In the metal business, the wind turbine business is driving us. Here we have a view of some of the equipment of the Grand Paris Express sites and projects. Energy systems: we have an increased revenue, +7.7%. Most of the growth comes from the international business, +19%. Spain enjoyed a 50% growth.
Our branches are very much present in the renewable energy business and have been exporting this knowhow to South America and Africa. We have an improved revenue of 50%, mostly in Spain. Kropman in Netherlands, which we bought back in 2018, had a great year, EUR 200 million in sales. France, growth is less significant, but still 3% steady growth in the territories. We have, of course, our four brands at the bottom right corner of the slide, and we are always working on improving profit margins. Here we have our brands on uniforms and LCVs. You may remember the Pereire concession now. There was a slowdown in heavy goods vehicles. It was only down 1%. Light vehicles, on the contrary, enjoyed a 1% growth, 1.1% growth. Maybe this is especially at the end of the year when there were the rail strikes. People moved to highways instead.
APRR has been continuing its investment programs on its network, keeping costs under control. EBITDA margin stands now at 74.4%. There you have a project, Grassy. We are working here on keeping the costs on highway maintenance and services such as fuel stations. Revenue on roads is up 9%; this is an 18% contribution to the 18% growth in profit, continuing profit in concessions and PPPs. We also have maintenance services in our portfolio. You have here an example of the Promenade Pereire in 5,600 meters in the heart of Paris, will have police stations for the first arrondissements of Paris. That's where the police station will be centralized. These are the business units; these are the two indicators, of course, revenue and current profits from ordinary activities.
We see that the other expenses, operating expenses, EUR 68 million , include transactions on a number of operations. We had fees, due diligence, especially for the Toulouse Airport. Net debt: the cost of net debt is down for the fifth year running, minus EUR 101 million. The basis of comparison in 2018 included the Eiffage rate swap. That was a favorable comparison basis. Now financial expenses are now down to EUR 135 million, including Eiffage and APRR. In other financial costs and income, we have the dividends from Getlink, about EUR 10 million. That explains the difference between 2019 and 2018. Income tax mechanically increased, and that made sense. You may remember I explained this back in June because the tax credit was turned into a deductible expense, and so that made a difference. Now the tax rate is 33.7% instead of 32.5%.
Net income group share stands at EUR 725 million, up 15% compared to 2018. The two main reasons, the increase in operating profit from ordinary activities, both in contracting and concessions, and, of course, lower financial costs. Regarding the cost of net debt, and if you look at the flow chart, at the end of 2018, the debt stood at EUR 10.5 billion. In order to be completely consistent, you may remember the leasing debt stood at EUR 359 million. That's the thing in the gray spot at the top of that first bar. That is no longer included at the end of the period because we analyzed not including the leasing debt because of the change in IFRS 16 standards. Now we start at EUR 10.185 billion. There was, of course, EBITDA that generated an increase of EUR 185 million.
That's when you restate it for IFRS 16. Working capital requirements were stable both in concession and in contracting, which is significant for contracting because in roadwork and property development, these are businesses that require a lot of cash, and so we were able to keep WCR under control. Interest and taxes were down EUR 73 million. That included also a significant decrease in financial interest and interest, EUR 144 million. Capital expenditure on capital goods was EUR 255 million. That's an increase compared to 2018. You may remember that you have new machines that, of course, are part of the capital expenditure. There was also additional investment for new launch plans with APRR. We're looking at EUR 537 million. That's an increase compared to 2018, and that's because we have been ramping up these projects, especially at APRR.
Free cash flow stood at EUR 1.280 billion compared with EUR 992 million last year. Roughly, we're looking at an improvement in free cash flow to the tune of about EUR 300 million; two-thirds of it, EUR 200 million, comes from EBITDA. Of course, there's a EUR 100 million improvement in WCR, a change in WCR. That enabled us to spend EUR 566 million in capital expenditures, including the Toulouse airport. Of course, there's Meccoli, the railway service company. Looking at variations without cash flows, we have about EUR 130 million. That's, of course, the debt for the Toulouse-Blagnac Airport. This is not now consolidated. We're looking at the total cash out was EUR 566 million. There was about EUR 566, including, of course, the investment in Toulouse. We have the dividends paid out by Eiffage; that's operations capital.
Of course, our direct shareholders, we're looking at an increase of EUR 37 million in dividends compared to 2018. If we stay on that slide, the net debt at the end of the year stood at EUR 10.2 billion. It's pretty much, not including the IFRS 16 change in accounting method, we have more or less the same free cash flow position, but we were able to pay for our own investment, for our own CapEx to the tune of EUR 566 million. Here we have the two blocks, debt versus cash. Of course, they're not to scale. Debt without recourse for a concession is pretty much the same as last year, but this year we include EUR 128 million for the Toulouse-Blagnac Airport. In red, you have the cash position of holding and contracting.
It is improved because of the new accounting method because we no longer have the leasing. It was about EUR 354 million. You remember that we used that to pay for all of the EUR 566 million in external growth in acquisitions. That means that we have a pretty good cash generation at the end of the year when everything was said and done. One highlight regarding the debt position: we were able to refinance our credit lines for Eiffage and APRR. These are undrawn credit lines. We include a number of indicators, about EUR 100 billion in terms of safety and security. We're one of the safest issuers of bond instruments in the country. If you look at the order book over a period of one year, it is up about 2% over the year.
You have in 2018, of course, the major step that's Grand Paris Express, plus 15%. The great thing here is we were able to keep the order book high at EUR 14 billion, having already produced EUR 700 million worth of projects in the Grand Paris Express project. One details the deals that haven't been formalized regarding the RCEA concessions, the Lille Airport, the PPP, and A3 highway in Germany. These are not included in the order book. If they were included, we would be looking at 12.3 months worth of business. That, as you can see on the left-hand side, is our standard level. In absolute numbers, or indeed in relative value, we are very much in line with our usual figures. That's for the numbers. Now we have time for questions. I believe that each of you will be entitled to three questions. Merci.
[Non-English content] effectivement.
Indeed, three questions. If we can start with the construction contractor. Civil engineering, there is an improvement of EUR 37 million of the current operational margin. Can we have the details of this improvement? Is it mainly the railroad works or the motorway? Is it the part which is very leveraging the wind farms? Second question: risk equation in Bavaria on the works. Who's conducting the study? You? The land of Bavaria? Is it on the border rail work? It is EUR 1.5 billion. On the airport part, the importance, not the past but the future. If you want the analyst to value those assets, could we have, from a quality point of view, the factors of improvement on Toulouse and on the Lille airports? Thank you.
First question: the improvement was split in all the activities.
We have an improvement of the performance of motorways in France due to the improvement of the way the works are being performed on the road. We have 10% of growth, which is quite a help. On civil engineering, also an improvement of the margin, more due to the volume than by the way of the works, because on the Grand Paris Express, the lot 16.1, we managed cautiously the budget. Even if we hope a margin positive, even very positive at the end of the project, we manage it in a very cautious way. On metal, yes, on the windmills onshore and offshore, we have a margin improvement. It's only much more limited in France. It's difficult to improve the profitability except on metal, which is very limited here in France to EUR 100 million, more or less.
On motorway A3, we are in a PPP; we are bearing all of the responsibility of design and construction. It's been two years we've been working. It's a process where we receive from the state or the government a very advanced project, during all this period of call for tender, we have all our study bureaus who worked on the fine-tuning of this project. It lasts quite a long time because we're going to implement it in five years. In the conditions of this call for tender, we are required not to bother people on 80 km. We work on bits and pieces of 80 km performed one after the other. In terms of risk, it's a full -risk process which is taken by the concessionaire; the risk of works and construction is handed back to the designer -constructor. we're at a 50/50 partnership there.
Do you confirm that your German partner is very profitable? If we look at the accounts, they have an unusual margin of profitability for a German group. I'm really amazed. Can we expect high margin on this project? Let's not forget that in Germany, margins are much lower than in France.
Margins in Germany are lower; they just improve for a certain amount of years, we do not wish them to stop there. There will be positive fallbacks in terms of volume. Our assumptions from the beginning when we started the A94 were held until now. To date, it's delivered; we had no problems. We were on target. Those PPPs in Germany are really accretive in the global scheme of the German activity. I'll add that Bunte is not a unicorn. You have several companies like Bunte doing margins above the historic margins in Germany or in Europe.
On the airport issues or questions, the two schemes are totally different. The two processes are different. On Lille Airport, the will of the concession giver is to change the duration of the public service delegation due to important investments to be made there in order to get the needed growth on the 20 years. Would they have remained on a PSD in 20 years, you cannot balance them, so you would get at a much lower ambition. They moved to a 20-year project, enabling us to come up with a global proposition of investment to support the development of this airport. It's on this space that we have been chosen. Given the fact, as I said, in June, the cost of acquisition is very low because it's just the non-amortized capital of the previous concessionaire.
It's the investment plan that will make the historic value of this concession for the 20 years to come. We have to build everything in terms of receipt, improvement, and change of functioning of operation of this airport. On Toulouse, it's a different project because Casil was pushed a lot for the development of the airport for those who go there. In the past years, they did a property development with a hotel. They rethought the retail and trading zone. We think we have still many things to do on property development. The teams on location really wish to share with our planning teams. On the improvement side and monitoring of what is operational costs, we have a lot of discussion of good practices between the motorway concession teams and the airport teams.
We are in a different process. The CapEx, capital expenditures, will be lower than what they would be in Lille, given what I said previously. Really, it's two different processes, and the platform is not the same size as you know. One last element about Toulouse: what's interesting there is that it's a regional airport. Given its geographic situation, its economic activity has a very sounder balance. You have the airspace cluster nearby, which needs the airport, and conversely so, which is interwoven into the airport and bearing a lot of development. You have investments made by the métropole. We're glad to build that part as a builder, as a constructor, contractor. As an economic pole of development, it is very strong and more traditional processes for those regional airports who develop new lines from a touristic point of view.
When you look at the passenger mix, it's one of the regional airports who has much more traffic, which is export. I mean, people from Occitania going elsewhere for business reasons or tourism. Our partners of all of the local collectivities are absolutely sure that there's much more to do to improve the import part of the coming traffic. [Non-English content] Pierre Rosset of HSBC.
Pierre Rosset, HSBC. I'll ask my three questions. About the airports, can you give us an idea of the returns you wish to have on the airports? Second question: EUR 1.4 billion of investment works on the concessions. What will be the steps on the three, four years to come, and some negation of the CapEx of APRR? My third question is about the preliminary studies on the future contracts of the Grand Paris. What can we expect? Will it have something to do about the margins in the near future?
On the phasing of the CapEx. CapEx. All of our PPP, small size, adding the CapEx of the two airports of Toulouse and Lille, we can start on EUR 100 million 2020, EUR 120 million 2021, 2022, and then EUR 50 million known as of today in 2023. It will be reprocessed, restated. Outside of APRR, we'll have the A3 with EUR 1.4 billion. It's the works construction, not the CapEx. A3, €750 million in works construction. Probably it will not be consolidated. It will not be translated by CapEx with exception with our quota share of share equity, capital equity. The phasing of A3 is linear on five years, taking half a year for 2020. Finally, RCEA, very short works. Phasing is linked to the date of start.
It has to be spread on 30 month. We'll discuss it in June. Sensitivity on the year is very important. Today, I think it's difficult to anticipate a figure.
Guillaume, about the Grand Paris.
I didn't forget your first question. Hello? On the processes of Grand Paris, it will keep us busy. The second phase of design implementation will be launched very soon. The first call for tender by mid-March, with studies that we think will be starting at the beginning of the summer, will keep us busy for the second half -year. The studies will start this summer and go on 2020, 2021. The workload will not be on 2020, but on 2020, 2021. We have amounts in 2020 which are consistent with what we're doing in terms of volume. No major impact on the trends of the outcome for 2020.
Another element regarding the studies, there are discussions. The Société du Grand Paris asking us to study design. It's not amounts what we're used to, so there are discussions about who's paying for the study in case we don't win the project. Well, depending about the degree of advancement of the studies, when they will start or issue the call for tenders. The only certainty is that there will be no impact as such in 2020, because it's going to be the first outcome are not expected between mid-2021 for the call for tenders. On the TRIs, I think we should look into it case by case because of the differences in risk profiles. We're not used to communicate by assets, so you won't be surprised that I will not answer with figures. However, you probably heard that there was a call for tender of Toulouse Castres.
It's also elements of thinking and strategy in the competitive environment like ours. We can give some elements of background that could help you in your own approach of the impacts of those concessions. If I take APRR, we disclose investment of EUR 200 million for 2% on market price, minored by a rest of EUR 60 million, and the TRIs that you have in the models, they shouldn't be changed. On RCEA, it's an investment in France in a greenfield with a proven traffic and a continuity of flow. The historic, the legacy model of concession of the motorways in France is well known. We have the principle of a revision of our schedule over the 48 years, and not in a regulation framework or dialogue year after year. It's in the classical system for the whole period of the concession, 48 years.
A3, it's an investment in Germany in a PPP without traffic risk. We enjoy the return of experience of A94. We have a return to debt, like in all our PPPs. As I said previously in my presentation, EUR 100 million of shareholder equity, EUR 800 million of debts, EUR 700. Given the subsidies and the debt, the TRI impact on the final suggestion or proposal is less important, as we see in our PPP of housing. Lille, we are below the amount of passengers getting into regulated process by the regulator. We're in an investment plan with targets and with shares above the limit. It was the model prevailing before this element. Toulouse, the investment is implemented at the market price. I told you the EBITDA of 2019 and the sales of 2029; we acquired on 10 times something multiple of EBITDA.
We will go on with the work that has been started by the management for the levers of improvement, our classical new lines, work on the OPEX. It's rather classical. I'll insist upon something that we will mainly pacify the relation within the monitoring board. We are legacy partners, and this is what's very important there. All the rest, I said a word about it. A mix with the presence of the airspace cluster, making this asset slightly different from what you may have in the other airport concessions. There are some elements that I wish to share with you for you to make your own assumptions.
Bonjour. Good evening. I'm with Barclays. I have three questions as well. Number 1, a follow-up question after what you said about the assets and IRR. Can you give us a reminder about the ART regulations and the ART authority, that is, the highway authority, should give a ruling on tolls and rates? The second question, I get the feeling that all the big projects that you can bid for, the A3 highway, the APRR. Are there new projects in the cards? How are you developing your airports? This is something new to you. Is it the concept that you're learning the ropes now, and you can grow in earnest once you're more comfortable, or you proposing to start growing here and now in the airport business?
About the Grand Paris Express, can we have a timetable of what's coming in the next few years? Regarding ATB, that is the airport. There was a 1-year extension on the existing contract. Talks are underway, conducted by ART, which is the Airport Authority, and the Civil Aviation Authority. We have to see what is regulated, what is not regulated. That makes a big difference. There have been exchanges with the management team at Toulouse-Blagnac Airport and the Civil Aviation Authority, DGAC, to define the framework within which these regulation contracts will be worked out. For the year 2020, we're waiting for this sort of generic framework so that we can have something to work with. There will be direct talks for the year 2020. Of course, the company is doing well. The rates might come down.
We are trying to arrive at a new contract for 2020, or that will be negotiated in 2020 to be implemented in 2021, so as to define the new rates. That's what's in the plan for Toulouse-Blagnac Airport, ATB, Aéroport de Toulouse-Blagnac, ATB. There's a second question about developing our, or growing our airport business. Was there another question in between? If you're looking at the pipeline of greenfield operations, there will be others in Germany; you can well imagine that first we are looking at rolling out the A3 highway in Germany rather than looking for other projects. Of course, if something comes up too soon, we will have to leave it aside; we'll have to wait until 2021, before we can look at new projects for Germany.
In France, the only one where there's a call for bids, it's the Toulouse-Castres road, that's not before 2021. For the year 2020, right now, there are no major projects, which is just as well because, having secured the highways that we have, we wouldn't have much room. When we got Lot 16-1 of Grand Paris, we had to bow out of a couple of contracts, even though we had won the contracts, but because we had to focus our efforts on other business. Now there's been a rescheduling of capital expenditure; that's just as well because, as I said, we are in a position now to address the projects that were left, as it were, aside. Nothing new will happen in this respect before 2021. That's the existing projects and putting a cap on that.
Regarding the airport business, our hope is not just to grow our airport business and just add up or pile up airport assets. We do have a presence in a number of territories. In any territory where we have a presence around the country, not just in France but also in Benelux, Germany, Spain, and a few African countries, wherever we do business, either there's some construction or that is contracting work, PPPs as well, or concessions. Of course, ideally, when we have one, we'd like to have the others. If we have contracting, we'd like to have concessions. Of course, the only risk for concessions is political risk. We've been looking for ways to manage risk. The best way to do this is to be an employer, to have a well -asserted CSR corporate social responsibility, so as to have good relations with the authorities.
Those areas where we do have projects underway enable us to have a long-term vision. This is exactly where we look for possible concessions, because we know that we can keep political risk under control. For instance, when we had hydropower plants and dams, even though we had just built them without a concession, we might get concessions there. Of course, natural concessions would be roads and airports. If we have a regional airport in a German land where we are present and recognized, or indeed in Belgium, for instance, or indeed in Spain. Now in Spain, they're all privatized, I believe. That would be a possible target for this group, but simply because there's a good consistency between our contracting and our concession businesses. The main asset in this company is human capital.
I can assure you, if you look at the 3,000 people from the Occitanie region, when they saw that our company took over the Toulouse-Blagnac Airport, that was a very favorable factor for our employees from the Occitanie region and, of course, our clients as well. Because we enjoy this popularity. Of course, we may not have all the know-how, and this is something where we have to learn, because within an airport there are lots of businesses. You have the operation of the airport, the maintenance, the building itself, the land, property development, franchises, hotels, parking lots, et cetera. There are many areas where we do have expertise and know-how. However, to run an airline, well, that's something we yet have to learn.
We are fortunate here in as much as we've had very good teams, people who have joined us, and on the strength of that, we will continue the business. The idea is not acquiring an airport for the sake of acquiring airports. We will not going to buy, say, an airport at the other end of the world just for the sake of acquiring a new airport. There are many countries where we have a long-term presence. We do have a concession in Senegal. It's doing extremely well. Had we not been in Senegal for 94 years, it would be a much riskier proposition in political terms to be concession holders in Senegal. It is thanks to our long-standing presence there that we can take a calculated risk. Yes, a further question.
Good evening. My name is Eric Lemarié. I had four questions.
Number one, on roadwork, are you looking at less business, less revenue in France because of the upcoming elections? If so, by how much? Second, about the connected territories in the Finistère, Brittany area, can you give us any clarification, any details? In terms of revenue, are we looking at something significant? These connected territories, I can't quite figure it out. Number three, can you tell us about your constructions or your sites, civil works, or buildings? To what extent are they digitalized? Do you have the BIM type thing? With the Grand Paris Express thing, do you believe that somehow there's a greater risk of performance, is there a performance risk on these things or higher performance risk for public works at Eiffage?
Sorry. Before I take this, there was a question by Nabil that Guillaume can take. Sorry.
Just a second, and then I'll get back to you. Yes.
Yes. You're talking about the Grand Paris contract on 16.1 between Aulnay and Saint-Denis and on the 15 south line. These are projects underway. There's a second wave of call for bids. So we have put a number of bids. That is for line 18.2; that's the south of Paris. That's a line between Massy and the Atomic Energy building. There's another one where we have bid; that's line 16.3. That's a number of tunnels that will complete line 16. That's northeast of Paris. That bid is underway. We'll get the answers at year's end. Then there's a final lot, and that is that we were just applying. Now, application means that before we know who wins it, we have about a year to wait. On lot 17.2, that's the extension of line 17.
That will connect Saint-Denis Pleyel all the way to CDG Airport. Basically, you're looking at the area between the Bourget and Gonesse and all the way to the Paris Airport area, the Roissy Airport area. We are trying to position ourselves for that. After that, you have a number of design and build contracts. The city has decided to move from design and build for portions of line 15. That will go from Pont de Sèvres all the way to the La Défense. That's the southwest segment. There will be an additional segment from La Défense all the way to Saint-Denis Pleyel, that's northwest. On the eastern side, you have two segments that will be added. One from Champigny, where TBM has just started work, going all the way to Bondy, due north.
The final segment from Bondy to go all the way back to Saint-Denis Pleyel. There are four design and build contracts that are up for grants. One, where applications have to be sent in by March. This will be considered in the second half of 2020. We expect to have assignments by 2021. It's hard to tell. Beginning of 2022. For the four following contracts, we don't know for sure, but we're looking at a year or a year and a half before these four contracts are awarded.
Thank you. Guillaume, can you give the microphone to Laurent so he can take the question on roadworks?
Yes, in 2020, we are not particularly concerned as regards business in 2020. If there's any decline, it won't be much. The reason is that we're starting the year with a pretty good order book.
We are looking at sustained business for at least 6 months. If we look at our various clients for local authorities, we can see that the financial condition of local authorities is better now than it was back 6 years ago, with 2014 and a big election year. For municipalities, we find that the finances were restructured because municipalities or small towns got together, and then we have big towns, these big what you call "metropoles," that have grown outside the election schedule. By the way, the investment we're looking for metropole is the same as what we invest elsewhere in all of the country. For department, now this is a pre-election year. Département local elections will be in 2021, will be next year, so this is a rather good period. Now, the central government proposes to expand investment in 2020.
Now, we don't have many contracts with the central government. Private market is still healthy, and I believe there will be a few worthwhile operations with the highway companies for maintenance or , indeed, for new highways. We have reason to believe that we will have a sustained roadworks business in 2020. If there's any decline, it will be very limited in 2020. Certainly not the same order of magnitude as what we had in 2014. You have to remember that in 2014, local authorities suffered a big cut in their subsidies, and that, of course, meant a big loss of business. Regarding the connected territories, this is one of these projects that, well, they're not huge, they're not significant in terms of revenue.
Of course, in terms of image, and indeed for our customers and indeed for our own people, there's raised awareness as to the coverage of services we provide because they're all integrated, connected services. That helps our client better drive their contracts, their own projects, rather. Instead of, say, sort of answering a question, we're there providing solutions just by compiling the best that is available and providing our clients with additional intelligence so that they can perform even better. There's more to come. The data analysis, the sort of thing that helps drive projects, and we can bring added value to our customers. That's what the connected territory thing is all about. Of course, in terms of immediate revenue, there's nothing significant now. There was a question regarding digitalization, yes? BIM or civil works civil engineering.
Now, by the way, it's not just public works, and we could start with highway concessions. You have digital developments there because initially, the whole business was very much a process-driven business, but it was all paper process. Now, the thing is, when you have a process that is well run and has been like a well-oiled machinery from year to year, the nice thing is it starts being all on paper, but you can very easily make it paperless, digitalize everything, and that certainly makes life easier for all people working on the ground. We can have immediate knowledge on the whole supply lines, anything to do with accidents or incidents.
The line. I speak here under the supervision of Philippe. By the end of 2020, I believe that 80%-90% of all the trades on the highway concession business will be digitalized. This is something we started back in 2017. We find that we're in a good position to acquire and analyze data. That's regarding highway concessions. There are other areas. For instance, we've decided to set up a company that will enable us to drive all our long-term maintenance programs. The idea is to collect not just data but behavior, so that we are in a position to have a very accurate forecast of renewal investment and long-term capital expenditure.
A lot of interest and synergies between our teams and the concession teams to deliver quality, but also return of experience and enrich the various elements.
I talked about the company because we know how to sell the services with other contractors, knowing that we have contracts with several local authorities who don't even know what is their heritage. To foresee the maintenance of the heritage is something different. If I get back to the businesses, it's three different various sides. One part, which is an interface with the final client, final customer. We're able today to capture information on the stakeholders in terms of property, to test the project, so to speak, upstream of its finalization. More and more, the first thing that an elected rep tells you, it's a major meeting; please present your project." Better to capture the digital tools enabling you to do so that our project upstream is already designed given the constraints of the various stakeholders.
Many more examples on which we start to be able to interact with the end user, insofar that the relation is contractual and our core business remains B2B. I'd say it's becoming B2B2C, since we're more and more able to capture this daily information, reinject it in our decision-making processes. The second element is whatever is about really the core business. We talk about the BIM, but I think that we move forward a lot in the solutions, in the use. It's a cost more than an opportunity; let's be transparent about that, but the real change is not yet there, except in some places. If you go on our works, you don't see the fantastic change in the tool given to the worker for him to do what he has to do.
When we'll be at the end of this chain that we'll be able to say that we have a strong impact of the digitization of our businesses. In some places, it's already implemented. In some of our factories, when you have factory activities, for instance, the factory process of façade at Goyer is totally different from what it used to be some years ago. We have more and more, and we will deliver more and more tools of training, which are immediately on the ground, a support to explain to the worker exactly what is expected of him. Like we did some years ago, but it's not very powerful yet, but we're already convinced that this is the right direction if we want to see strong impacts.
The other element on which we already progressed is in terms of HR, in terms of training, because a good video makes things much easier. Games, series games, learn by games, train by games. It's things we're using more and more, and we'll progress there. Last element is whatever is relative to the IT systems and the support of the company, but Christian will say a word about that. Well, we explained that on the accounting finance, we have an ERP, which is unique in France, unique to all the businesses that will be rolled out internationally, enabling to do data analysis and to progress. We seize the occasion to create what other industries did before us. Create a back office and a front office with the shared services centers, enabling to mutualize the tasks, to digitize them, to automate them.
We are not yet at the AI, maybe we'll discuss that, but we have robots. We have over 30 robots that are working in accounting. We are convinced that we're not at the end of the road. We didn't explore all the possibilities, and I'm sure we'll move fast on this topic. Indeed, it generates changes in way of doing a lot of more processes, but it makes us progress in terms of separation of tasks and be more rigorous relations with the projects. It's a project which is really moving very fast, and it will improve in terms of productivity, efficiency, and savings. We start on the HR, the single ERP 2013. We ramped up of the shared services 2016, and of deployment. We shall derive all the benefits now. We start the same process on the HR, but we just start on the HR.
Last question was about the execution risk, right? We never had so many tunnels at the same place. Well, basically, keep in mind we're very cautious, as Christian explained on the acknowledgment of our margins. Whatever we're doing in the Grand Paris, we're not the designers. The risk levels and the functioning of the risk is very different and so good because it will enable us to look forward to stage 2, where the Grand Paris asked us to be a designer and builder. Risk will be more important. When you are in geology of Paris and Paris area or a tunnel borer, I won't tell you that there are no risks, obviously. We have very experienced teams who are used to do that.
Those are grounds we know. We have an ecosystem with the Société du Grand Paris. They have a certain amount of teams and operatives that know what is happening. We dig below the ground between 20 and 50 meters in very dense areas. There are indeed risks. However, the sharing of those risks and the contracts that we are implementing are fully respectful of a right balance between the company and the client. One point about digitization, it's linked to accounting. This is important. The procurement. We have a procurement base, which is administered centrally. We have a performing tool looking like what you have on an Amazon portal, enabling to order easily, which has not always been the case. It's not always easy to make the orders.
Now we have it with the strength of managing a central database and know granularly the configuration of our acquisitions in order to progress, optimize, orient the acquisitions. It's illusory to think that you can manage them centrally, but a tool enabling you to go into a item base can be a tool which is very efficient in our businesses. Philippe Nourry told me that we didn't answer to one question about the CapEx of APRR. I answered, "Pierre, was this question of the EUR 1.4 billion of concessions process and not listed in Germany and other concessions?" Maybe you can answer and get back to what I said about RCEA. I can't remember who asked the question. I'll get back to 2019. In fact, we committed EUR 485 million investment. It's slightly less than the estimate I provided in our last meeting last August. Slight gap with some operations.
For the future, even if we commissioned three major operations at the last quarter 2019, Auxerre, Mâcon, and the third place, we'll be very active on the major operations of the motorway plan with our two operations, A75 Clermont-Ferrand and A480 in Clermont-Ferrand. A commitment investment of EUR 500 million with a decrease that will start in 2021 because we're on the EUR 400 million on 2021 and EUR 350 million in 2022. This is the future that is taken into account as of today.
Good evening. Nicolas Mora, Morgan Stanley. I'll shoot in many directions. On M&A, 2019 was devoted to concessions. Will you change your munition? First question. Second, on property, very good year, 2019. The competitors is more moderate. What do you see at Eiffage in terms of perspective of reservation and margins? About Construction, you talked about the scissor effect of the margins.
The inflation has pacified. Is there a little bit of hope to see the margins to ramp up in 2020, 2021? On motorways, if there's no volume, will there be a rise in the margins in 2021? On services in France in 2019, you are lagging behind your competitors. Are you more cautious about the cycle to grow the margin 2,025 basis points per year? Last question, we can try it on the APRR traffic. What are you seeing since the beginning of the year? We hope for good news. Thank you.
Let's start with Philippe because he has the mic.
Naturally, I won't give you the figure, but the trends. We registered a very good beginning of the year with, in January, without a shadow of a doubt, the ongoing effect or impact of the strike of the French railways. Very good beginning of winter season with sequences, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, very dynamic on the APRR and the other network too. A heavyweight traffic, which is decreasing. We are on a growth close to the figures that Christian alluded to for 2019, plus 0.5 and plus 1%.
Can you hand over to Olivier?
Hello. For property, yes, we had a very good year with 5,000 housing units. When we talk about 400 more, it's block sales of student residencies. It's a very good year. When you say that the competitors are really at pain, it's not true for everybody. In the results of our competitors in property, there are some good, very good, and some bad. It's due to the capacity of renewal of the book of orders. Capacity is good with us.
We have the capacity of having a good forecast, and we have nice tertiary operations in the pipes. There's no decrease in activity, neither in 2020 nor in 2021 regarding property. Regarding construction questions, is there hope to see the margins increase? If the question would have been shorter, that would have been the answer. Yes, there is a light hope to see the margins increase because the scissor effect will come to an end, and there is volume, which is the first criterion for upturn of the margins. On the motorway part, decrease of volume, can we have the margins progress? We're working on that. It's very sensitive to the volume. It would need this decrease to be moderate. If the decrease would be more significant, it would possibly have an impact on the margin.
We are today in a scenario of moderate decrease of volume; we can maintain the margin and why not improve it slightly. Another sensitive element is the industries. You have page 22 of your booklet. The growth is not done through the industries because we had a lot of work with less industries; the mix beyond the sales can be very impacting one way or the other. On the energy system line of business, the more the profitability rises, the more the margin is difficult. The work we led with a strategic plan of the line of business is delivering. We successfully found the operational function by keeping the proximity and by being ambassadors of all our specialties, and to mix this capacity to go on doing work and delivering value on all the territories where we are present.
This is underlying our progression, little by little, of the profitability of this line of business. What I may add is there's no exceptional effect in the improvement of profitability. We are on long-run work, little by little, notch by notch. There's a real pride of the team of the line of business to carry on. They're all convinced to go on at the same pace. It's tougher now, the more you climb, as the gap, as the added value on excessively technological part be present. For them to grow thanks to people who are on the ground and making more and more innovative offers. The time being, we have areas which are lagging behind, and we try to improve that. The improvement you have seen for the past years is mainly, how should I say, diminishing the gap. There's no reason why we couldn't reach 5%.
If you look at our major competitors, some aren't doing that well at all. Some are doing better and for quite a long time, proving that those are projects of several thousand EUR. There's a process; there is a system to go up to a team of two or three people doing some maintenance somewhere. The major interest is when they're aligned, and they all got it. It's a win-win situation, but it takes quite a long time to get there, and the best in business are there for quite a certain amount of years. We remained on our core business, European core business. We don't have, well, some markets in North America where the brand mix are more important than Europe. The acquisitions are without common measure. We don't want to get out from our ecosystem. We have capacities today.
We would like to grow in Belgium and Germany, and we have already some, how should I say, structures existing. We don't have the possibility of hitting hard there. We are very present on other lines of business. There's an exception to what I said; it's Spain, and I see José M anuel. I think it's really we are leaders on the market in those businesses in terms of volume, geography, but also economic performance. Yes, we will go on. I just hope that we'll be able to maintain this rhythm or pace. On the M&A, yes, it was more concession this year. Let me remind you that before we made some important acquisitions, Kropman in the Netherlands, but also Priora in Switzerland, and acquisitions, smaller ones, adding to the Spanish geography.
We told you that 2019, we would focus more on integration, and the only significant acquisition was Meccoli in railways, railroads to start and come up with a real player of railroads present in all the businesses. We do not have structuring and transforming projects on the short term; we will remain open on the energy system branch or line of business, either for acquisition of technology on the French territory or add to our coverage in the major European countries I quoted previously. It will remain bolt-on, so to say. Apart from energy and services, there's nothing really new. We had 10% growth two years running in our contracting business, that has kept us busy. That is also very much value -creating; that's why we're mostly focused on that.
Are there further questions? Well, we shall leave it at that.
Let me just remind you that since there were many of you this evening, it was a bit difficult to get you all down to visit the tunnel boring machine, one of our TBMs. People working on lot 16-1 have come up with models. They'll explain everything to you, and these TBMs will have no secrets for you.