By Joel E. Zurbano
MOTORISTS traveling to Baguio from Manila will cut one-and-a-half hours from their six-hour travel time once the P14.61-billion Tarlac-La Union Expressway is completed in 2013.
Work on stage one of the 84-kilometer, four-lane toll road starts next January after the highways department awarded the contract to build and maintain the road to Private Infra Development Corp.
P469.99 million of the road’s P14.61-billion budget is for engineering, P13.347 billion is for civil works, supervision and project management, and P793 million is for right-of-way acquisition.
“The government shall provide for the acquisition of the road right-of-way and cash subsidy of P2.907 billion starting 2011,” project manager Bienvenida Fermalino said.
“The cost of how much per square meter, and the names and the number of the affected [people] will still be determined after the completion of the detailed engineering and parcellary survey,” she said.
The expressway begins in La Paz, Tarlac—the terminus of the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway—and ends in Rosario, La Union.
The road will run parallel to MacArthur Highway and pass through the municipalities of Victoria Gerona, Paniqui, Moncada and San Manuel in Tarlac; Carmen, Urdaneta, Binalonan, Pozzorubio and Sison in Pangasinan; and Rosario in La Union.
Stage one of the project will produce two lanes. Stage two will expand it into four lanes when its capacity reaches 25,000 vehicles.
Public Works Undersecretary Manuel Bonoan said the road would be built right of MacArthur Highway. It would cross to the left after Urdaneta because “it is the most logical alignment, and it will affect less people.”
The project has been awarded to contractors C.M Pancho; J.E. Manalo; New Kanlaon Construction; Rockford Development; D.M. Consunji; Engineering Equipment Inc.; First Balfour; J.V. Angeles; D. Policarpio and D.M. Wenceslao (all part of the Private Infra Development Corp.)
http://www.manilastandardtoday.com/?page=news3_feb4_2008
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