SAN Miguel
Corp. (SMC) is set to
submit by early August
a final joint agreement
to the provincial government of Cavite after the
former agreed with Metro
Pacific Investments Corp.
(MPIC) to jointly develop
an expressway connecting
Cavite and Batangas.
“The final joint
agreement will be submitted in the next two weeks,”
Cavite Gov. Juanito Victor
‘’Jonvic’’ Remulla Jr. said.
This was after
San Miguel and MPIC
agreed in principle to jointly develop an expressway
connecting Batangas and
Cavite provinces.
Remulla said San
Miguel and MPIC will submit a revised alignment for
the Cavite-Batangas Expressway (CBEx) Project.
The provincial
government earlier approved the P27-billion unsolicited proposal of San
Miguel Holdings Corp., the
infrastructure unit of SMC,
for the 27.06-kilometer
CBEx.
The CBEx will
traverse the municipalities
of Silang, Amadeo, Tagaytay, Indang, Mendez and
Alfonso in Cavite and Nasugbu in Batangas.
It is shorter than
the proposed toll road submitted by another group to
the national government.
San Miguel also
secured a 35-year concession to design, build,
operate and maintain the
four-lane, 61-kilometer toll
road or the Nasugbu-Bauwan Expressway (NBEx)
for P44.77 billion.
NBEx, which begins at Barangay Kaylaway, Nasugbu town, runs
parallel to Tagaytay-Nasugbu and Palico-Balayan
highways.
The terminus of
NBEx at Barangay Kaylaway connects the expressway to another SMC
Infrastructure project,
the Cavite-Batangas Expressway, which leads to
Tagaytay City and Silang,
Cavite.
Metro Pacific
Tollway Corp. (MPTC) in
2018 proposed to the Department of Public Works
and Highways (DPWH) a
similar project that would
also connect Cavite and
Batangas through Tagaytay City or the P22.4 billion
Cavite-Tagaytay Batangas Expressway (CTBEx)
Project.
The DPWH then
granted the original proponent status to MPTC for
CTBEx — a 50.4-kilometer toll road that will connect Cavite and Batangas,
with a spur road to Tagaytay City and ultimately terminating in Nasugbu and
another spur road to Tuy,
Batangas.
CTBEx is expected to decongest about
23,000 vehicles daily from
the nearby thoroughfares.
Cavite and
Batangas are rapidly-growing provinces
that host major industrial
parks, commercial districts
and residential projects.
MPTC operates
the North Luzon Expressway, Cavite Laguna Expressway, Subic-Clark
Tarlac Expressway, Manila-Cavite Expressway
and C5 Southlink Expressway.
SMC operates
the Tarlac-Pangasinan-La
Union Expressway, the
Skyway System that connects Balintawak to Makati
through an elevated expressway, the South Luzon Expressway A and the
Southern Tagalog Arterial
Road Tollway. MT
