PHL PPP initiative picks up pace as San Miguel breaks ground, MNTC vows to finish tollroads

The Philippine flagship infrastructure program, the public-private partnership initiative, is starting to pick up pace as San Miguel Corp. breaks ground for the P26.5 billion tollroad linking North Luzon Expressway to South Luzon Expressway.

 

San Miguel's Citra Central Expressway Corp. is holding a goundbreaking ceremony Wednesday for the NLEX-SLEX connector road led by President Benigno Aquino III.

 

Citra Central will start contructing the Metro Manila Skyway Stage 3 project extending the Skyway from Buendia in Makati all the way to Balintawak in Quezon City via a 14.82-kilometer, six-lane elevated expressway, Michael Arthur Sagcal, Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) spokesperson, said Tuesday.

 

“This is part of the DOTC’s ongoing program to upgrade our transportation infrastructure,” Sagcal noted. “It is expected to provide motorists with considerable relief from the traffic situation in Metro Manila,” he said.

 

The connector road is envisioned to decongest traffic along historic EDSA (Epifanio Delos Santos Avenue), as well as other major thoroughfares including Quezon Avenue, Araneta Avenue, and Nagtahan by an estimated 55,000 vehicles per day, and shorten travel time from Sen. Gil Puyat Avenue to Balintawak to 20 minutes from two hours.

 

An estimated P2.4-billion is lost daily on account of traffic in Metro Manila, according to a recent study by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). 

 

Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC), the conglomerate led by industrialist Manuel V. Pangilinan, is setting its sights at finishing toll road projects – valued at more than P30 billion – before President Aquino finishes his term in 2016.

 

The toll roads include the P1.6-billion Segment 9 and the P10.5 billion Segment 10.1 Harbor Link road and the P18 billion Segment 10.2 of the NLEX-SLEX connector road, said Rodrigo Franco, MPIC’s Manila North Tollways Corp. president, said at the launching Tuesday of the NLEX Metro Expressway Link projects spearheaded by the MPIC Group

 

The 2.42-kilometer, four-lane Segment 9 four-lane from the Smart Connect interchange to MacArthur Highway will start in May 2014 and be completed in June 2014, Franco noted.

 

Segment 10.1, a 5.64 kilometer, four-lane elevated expressway from MacArthur Highway to C-3 will be constructed in March be completed in February 2016

 

The latest Segment 10.2 is an eight-kilometer Connector Road from C-3 to the Polytechnic University of the Philippines in Sta. Mesa, which includes a 2.6-kilometer spur road from C-2 to Road 10 to the Manila International Container Terminal in Manila's Port Area.

 

Segment 10.1. will be partly financed by P7 billion worth Retail Treasury Bonds, which MNTC expects to issue in the first quarter, while the P18-billion Connector Road will be 30 percent financed by shareholders equity and 70 percent by debt, Franco said.

 

He added that MNTC is also looking at financing the about 70 percent of the P18 billion Connector Road through debt and the remaining 30 percent through equity from shareholders.

 

Also Tuesday, Franco noted Metro Pacific Tollways Development Corp. and state-run Philippine National Construction Corp. sealed a joint venture that allowed MNTC to commence the Connector Road project.

 

“The NLEX Metro Expressway Link is designed to enable travelers to vertically breeze through the Metropolis avoiding in the process high density areas mark by perennial traffic jams,” said Ramoncito Fernandez Metro Pacific Tollways president noted. – VS, GMA News