NLEX Corp. said Thursday it is willing to build a 1.2-kilometer road at a cost of P2 billion to link its ongoing eight-km NLEX Connector Road to San Miguel Corp.’s 18-kilometer Skyway Stage 3.
Metro Pacific Tollways Corp. chief finance officer Christopher Lizon said the new road will help expedite the completion of NLEX Connector. MPTC is the parent company of NLEX Corp., the operator of North Luzon Expressway.
“We wrote the DPWH [Department of Public Works and Highways] two weeks ago. We told them that we are willing to do the 1.2 kilometers [of road] to connect to Skyway,” Lizo said in a news briefing.
Lizo said his company would spend an additional P2 billion to construct the 1.2-kilometer road and the project would be completed within two months, if there were no right-of-way issues.
The P23-billion NLEX-SLEX Connector traverses the alignment from C3 Road on 5th Ave. to Espana Boulevard (5.15 kilometers) for Section 1 and from Espana to PUP Sta. Mesa (2.75 kilometers) for Section 2. From this point, the connector should link up with the Skyway Stage 3 that leads to SLEX.
SMC started works on a 1.2-km. road in January but the project faced delay amid ROW problems.
The NLEX Connector’s segment from Caloocan to Espana is now 96 percent complete, while the Espana to Sta. Mesa is 26-percent finished.
The Caloocan-España section of the NLEX Connector, which is targeted to open this month, has on and off ramps and toll plazas along C3 Road and España Boulevard, crosses over the Blumentritt Station of Light Rail Transit Line 1 and Dimasalang Bridge and uses steel box girders for its curved and highly-elevated areas.
The new road, which is also a part of the Luzon Spine Expressway Network, offers a recourse to shorten the travel time of cargoes going to and from the north and south of Luzon.
The whole eight-km. Caloocan-Sta. Mesa stretch of the NLEX Connector would be fully operational by the second quarter of 2023, according to the company.
Designed to cater to all vehicle classes including trucks, NLEX Connector intends to spur economic progress by improving the travel of motorists especially those in the logistics sector as the new road will shorten the travel time of cargoes.
NLEX expects at least 35,000 vehicles to benefit from the new road each day. The poject is also expected to improve the connectivity between airports and seaports.
Once fully completed, this will reduce travel time from NLEX to South Luzon Expressway to 20 minutes from the usual two hours, while travel from Clark to Calamba will be reduced to 1 hour and 40 minutes, instead of three hours.