Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada has given his all-out support to the P23.3-billion NLEX-SLEX Connector Road Project, assuring the city government’s full cooperation in securing the road rights-of-way and in relocating any affected informal settlers.
Estrada said the eight-kilometer elevated highway that will link the North Luzon and South Luzon expressways will be beneficial to the City of Manila, as it will help reduce traffic congestion in the capital city’s major thoroughfares.
“I fully support the project,” Estrada said after meeting with representatives and engineers of the North Luzon Expressway Corp. at the Manila City Hall last Friday. “This will help ease the traffic problem, not only in Manila, but the whole metropolis and other nearby cities.”
Estrada said that with the easing of traffic in the city, development in Manila, as well as in neighboring cities and provinces, “will be faster and better.”
NLEX Corp. is the private sector partner of the Department of Public Works and Highways in the first Public-Private Partnership project approved by the Duterte administration.
Engr. Edward Castro of NLEX Corporation said 85 percent of the alignment of the NLEX-SLEX Connector Road will pass through the 38 barangays of the City of Manila.
The elevated 2×2 highway extends the NLEX Southward lanes from the end of Segment 10 in C3 Road Caloocan City to the PUP Campus in Sta. Mesa, Manila.
The highway will also connect the common point of Skyway Stage 3, traversing mostly along the PNR rail track. Its interchanges will be on C3 Caloocan City and España in Manila.
According to Castro, work on the road-right-of-way has already started in the Caloocan side while in Manila, it will be on the coming week. Construction is set to start on 2018 and will be completed by 2020.
The major benefit of the road project, De Castro stressed, is reducing travel time from SLEX to NLEX from two hours to merely 20 minutes.
With the City of Manila’s support, the NLEX Corp. official said the issue on the affected informal settlers will be addressed effectively.
“NLEX Corp. will help in the project with the City of Manila, especially in the ISFs (informal settler families),” Castro said, estimating that about 3,500 families in the covered areas will be affected.
“We are coordinating with the Manila City government. We will notify the local government if there will be construction on the ground. By next week there will be schedules of the construction,” he added.