Megawide GMR Consortium said Thursday it will start the construction of Clark International Airport New Passenger Terminal Building in January next year.
“The aim is to have construction in full swing by January 2018 and completion of the NPTB is expected within 28 months,” Megawide GMR said in a statement.
The company said it would work closely with Clark International Airport Corp., the Bases Conversion and Development Authority, the local government units and other concerned agencies in the coming weeks to ensure that design would meet world-class standards and reflect local culture and scenery.
“As a matter of fact, the design will be a collaboration, wherein the main concept will come from Filipino architects and designers, working in tandem with international airport designers,” it said.
Megawide GMR said at the peak of construction, the project was expected to create 2,000 jobs mostly for local construction workers. It will engage the services of a network of local construction suppliers, service providers and related businesses. This will help maximize efficiencies while meeting the highest levels of quality workmanship, it said.
The project is expected to help decongest Ninoy Aquino International Airport by serving as catchment area, which presently includes North and Central Luzon and the northern areas of Metro Manila.
The proposed 101,977 square-meter terminal area will increase Clark Airport’s current capacity of 4 million passengers per annum to 12 mppa by 2020.
Airlines operating in Clark include Qatar Airways, Cebu Pacific, Tigerair, Jin Air, Asiana Airlines, Dragon Air, AirAsia Berhad, Philippine Airlines and Emirates Airlines. These airlines mount flights to Hong Kong, Singapore, Bangkok, Macau, Pudong, Incheon, Doha, Dubai, Davao , Cebu and Kalibo.
Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III said the rollout of the Clark International Airport expansion project within the first 18 months of the Duterte administration proved the “strong political will of the government to get things done fast” for the benefit of the people.
With Julito G. Rada
Dominguez said unlike in the previous administration when one big-ticket project”•the Cavite-Laguna Expressway”•took all of 50 months from conception to the start of implementation, the infrastructure
projects on the Duterte watch would start over the next few months.
“This shovel ready project was approved in the first 18 months of the Duterte administration. It demonstrates the political will to get things done,” Dominguez said at the groundbreaking rites for the
project in Clark, Pampanga.
“This administration brooks no delay in building the projects that the people need and the public deserves,” Dominguez said.
The Clark project is among the first big-ticket infra projects to be built using the Duterte administration’s ‘hybrid’ public-private partnership formula, where the government starts the initial phase of the project’s construction and later bids out the project to the private sector.
Dominguez cited the importance of the project in completing the infrastructure network in Central Luzon, and capturing what the ‘Build, Build, Build’ program aims to achieve, which is to put up a
“coherent national logistics circuit” in support of rapid and inclusive growth. With Julito G. Rada
