If two heads are better than one, as the saying goes, it doesn’t necessarily follow that two roads are better than one. In this particular case, one road is better than two.
We’re talking about the planned North Luzon Expressway-South Luzon Expressway (Nlex-Slex) Connector Road, a major infrastructure project that should really be implemented soon to address the horrible traffic congestion in Metro Manila.
The connector road was approved by the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) under the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) Program of the Aquino administration in 2013 as an unsolicited project by the Metro Pacific Tollways Development Corp. (MPTDC). The firm offered to build the connector road for P23.2 billion, inclusive of right-of-way costs. The road itself would cost P15.7 billion to build.
Both Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto M. Pernia and Public Works Secretary Mark A. Villar consider the connector road among the priority infrastructure projects of the Duterte administration to help alleviate Metro Manila’s traffic woes.
The connector-road project consists of an elevated four-lane, 8-kilometer expressway starting at Nlex Segment 10 at C-3 or Fifth Avenue in Caloocan City and connecting to the Slex, through Stage 3 of the Metro Manila Skyway System Project (Skyway 3) in Manila. The project will have at least two interchanges and two toll plazas. If started soon, the target completion is 2022, the year President Duterte leaves office.
The project would be a big boost in decongesting Metro Manila’s worsening traffic gridlock. Once completed, it will reduce travel time from Nlex to Slex from two hours to only 15 to 20 minutes. Traveling from Clark in Pampanga to Calamba in Laguna would also be cut down from about three hours to only one hour and 40 minutes.
These reduced travel times would result in better access to the three Ninoy Aquino International Airport (Naia) terminals and the Clark International Airport (CIA) in Pampanga.
The Nlex-Slex connector road would also provide freight trucks with an alternative 24/7 route, which will resolve truck-ban problems and ease port congestion, because shippers would now be encouraged to reroute their cargo from the congested North Harbor to the ports in Batangas City and the Subic Freeport.
Some 35,000 motorists are expected to benefit from the project, according to the Department of Public Works and Highways. The cost of transporting goods from North and Central Luzon to Metro Manila will also be drastically reduced once the project is in place.
As a result, we can expect more investors to come in because it would enhance connectivity between international airports and seaports, including the Subic Freeport by way of the Nlex-Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway route, the Batangas Port via Slex, and the CIA to the Naia.
This, in turn, will improve linkages between the key growth areas of Metro Manila, Central Luzon, North Luzon and the Clark-Subic corridor.
But the connector-road project has encountered numerous delays since MPTDC first submitted it as an unsolicited proposal to the Aquino administration in 2010.
Metro Pacific Tollways Corp. (MPTC) President Rodrigo Franco remains optimistic, however, that civil works on the project could start in 2018 and the entire road completed in three to four years, or before President Duterte steps down in 2022.
The Nlex-Slex connector-road project provides Transportation Secretary Arthur P. Tugade the answer to his problem of how to solve Metro Manila’s traffic gridlock. If the project pushes through as scheduled, then he wouldn’t have to be “kicked out of office” for being “useless,” as he himself declared in a recent
media interview.
The project fits the proponent, the MPTDC to a T, as its mother company, the Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC), is the largest toll-road operator in the country, operating 63 percent of the country’s 320 kilometers of toll roads.
MPIC is a leading toll-road operator not only in the Philippines, but in the rest of Asia, as well. MPIC, through MPTC, has completed an investment of 1.95 trillion Vietnamese dong (about P4.1 billion) in CII Bridges and Roads Investment Joint Stock Company (CII B&R) in Vietnam. CII B&R has eight toll-road and bridge projects spanning 123 kilometers combined in Vietnam. MPTC also owns a 29.45-percent stake in Don Muang Tollway Public Co. Ltd. in Thailand.
The completion of the connector road would benefit the economy in a big way. It will address the worsening problem of congestion at the Port of Manila, which is believed to have cost foreign and local businesses over $500 million in combined losses last year, per the European Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines.
We can avert losses of such magnitude if the government pushes through with the connector-road project before the last quarter of 2016. We can save billions of pesos daily, commuters would be more productive doing more work or spending more quality time with their families and loved ones rather than being mired in horrendous traffic.
E-mail: ernhil@yahoo.com.