The Metro Pacific group is spending P90 billion to build an expressway linking North Luzon Expressway and Manila-Cavite Expressway.
Metro Pacific Tollways Corp. president and chief executive Rodrigo Franco said the tentative project cost of the proposed NLEx-Cavitex Port Expressway Link was raised to P90.24 billion from an earlier estimate of P62.43 billion because of the tunnel component of the toll road.
The budget would come from NLEX Corp. and Cavitex Infrastructure Corp., operators of NLEx and Cavitex, respectively.
Franco said a tunnel expressway would be built between Rizal Park and US embassy at a cost of P40 billion.
The proposed NLEx-Cavitex Port Expressway is a 15-kilometer toll road with six lanes (2×3 configuration), with elevated and tunnel portions from NLEx Segment 10 up to Cavitex which will provide an ideal truck route directly linked to Manila Port Area.
The first phase of the project will stretch from C3 Road to Anda Circle (5.7 kilometers), while the second phase is a connection from Cavitex to Buendia (4.8 kilometers) and the last phase from Buendia Avenue to Anda Circle (4.6 km).
The project will reduce truck traffic within its limited capacity road network and significantly contribute in the decongestion of the metropolis 24 hours a day, MPTC said.
Cavitex is a 14-kilometer toll expressway linking Manila to the southern province of Cavite.
MPCALA Holdings Inc., a unit of MPIC, earlier submitted an unsolicited proposal to build Cavite-Tagaytay-Batangas Expressway, a 46-kilometer road worth P25 billion.
The project aims to link Cavite Expressway and Cavite Laguna Expressway in Silang, Cavite to Tagaytay City and will terminate in Nasugbu, Batangas.
The group is also constructing the P35-billon Cavite Laguna Expressway, a four-lane, 47-kilometer closed-system toll expressway connecting Cavitex and South Luzon Expressway.
The expressway will start from Cavitex in Kawit, Cavite and end at the South Luzon Expressway-Mamplasan Interchange in Biñan, Laguna.
MPTC is also building the NLEx-SLEx Connector Road, an eight-kilometer, four-lane toll road linking the North Luzon Expressway and South Luzon Expressway, passing through Metro Manila and using the existing Philippine National Railway alignment as its route.