CLC offers to develop Davao, Bohol intl airports
CHELSEA Logistics Holdings Corp. ( CLC) has submitted to the Department of Transportation (DoTr) an unsolicited P67-billion proposal to develop, operate, and manage the Davao and New Bohol international airports for 30 years.
In a statement on Friday, CLC President and CEO Chryss Alfonsus Damuy said his company would modernize these airports without any government subsidy and in three phases.
“However, for the economic viability of the project, succeeding works after the development of growth requirements and compliance with minimum performance standards,” he added.
In its proposal, CLC would operate and maintain the two airports’ existing assets, except those remaining with the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines, while undertaking the work needed to meet future passenger and aircraft movement.
The Davao airport is targeted to accommodate up to 30 hourly aircraft movements once a new full parallel taxiway is built.
By the end of the 30 years, the airport’s cargo terminal will be almost three times its current capacity to keep up with expected air freight demand.
The cargo terminal facility of the New Bohol airport in Panglao town, meanwhile, will expand by an additional 25 percent, according to CLC.
” If the government approves the CLC proposal in 2018, [ the] improvement of passenger experience and benefit to the community will start next year,” Damuy said.
Although CLC submitted the proposal on February 5, it was only disclosed two days after Aboitiz Equity Ventures (AEV), though subsidiary AboitizInfra Capital Inc., announced that it submitted an unsolicited P148billion proposal to upgrade and operate four regional airports for 35 years.
These are the Iloilo International Airport, Bacolod- Silay Airport in Negros Occidental, Laguindingan International Airport in Misamis Oriental, and New Bohol.
“We believe the Visayas and Mindanao are booming, not [ only] economically, but also in tourism,” AboitizInfra Capital Manager Iara Arcilla said in a press briefing.