Modern tollway to help Cebu build back better

Since 2014, the province of Cebu has never been dislodged as the richest Philippine province for six consecutive years. in 2019, it reported total assets of P203.9 billion, which represents a 472 percent increase in total assets from 2018’s P35.65 billion.

“It’s a nice title but that’s as far as it goes unless the people really feel the impact of being the richest province in the country,” said Governor Gwendolyn Garcia.

Like the rest of the country, Cebu is still battling the adverse effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. But it is finding ways to build basic foundational services to stimulate economic growth and improve the quality of life of Cebuanos. Infrastructure is vital to Cebu’s economic development.

For example, a modern tollway that connects Cebu City to the town of Cordova will become operational early next year. The Cebu-cordova Link Expressway (CCLEX) will give motorists an alternative route in crossing the Mactan Channel, steering clear of the traffic-clogged Mandaue-mactan Bridge and the Marcelo Fernan Bridge. This will open new business opportunities and spur the growth of industry, trade and tourism.

Builder Cebu Cordova Link Expressway Corp. recently reported that CCLEX is 70 percent complete. The project is a joint venture of the local governments of Cebu City, municipality of Cordova, and Metro Pacific Tollways Corp. through its wholly owned subsidiary CCLEC. The joint venture agreement provides for a 35-year concession. Under the accord, MPTC will undertake the financing, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of the expressway.

MPTC envisions CCLEX to go beyond decongesting and strengthening the capacity of Metro Cebu’s road network. It considers this P30-billion project as a catalyst that will help accelerate economic growth and boost investments not just in Cebu but all over the Visayas region.

CCLEX will have two lanes in each direction, and from the main bridge it will have the Cebu South Coastal Road (CSCR) on and off ramps going to the South Road Properties as well as a viaduct that levels down to a causeway in Cordova’s Barangay Pilipog. With a design speed of 80 kilometers per hour, the expressway will serve an estimated 50,000 vehicles per day, easing up the transport of people and goods within the expanding metropolis.

Urban planners said this will have a favorable effect on tourism as it eases traffic from and to the Mactan Cebu International Airport. This engineering marvel is 8.5 kilometers long and rises 51 meters from sea level. When completed, CCLEX will be the country’s largest water-crossing infrastructure, and promises to become a tourist attraction in the province.

Aside from being a unique engineering feat, CCLEX also has eight 40‐meter-tall crosses installed on two of its pylons over the Mactan Channel. These crosses, inspired by the wooden cross Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan planted in Cebu upon his arrival in 1521, were blessed and lighted last April 15th to mark the 500th anniversary of Christianity in the Philippines. The event has placed the Philippines in the historical world map of the first circumnavigation of the world.

Cebu’s economy has started to feel the positive effect of the CCLEX project. For example, land prices in the municipality of Cordova near the project site have been rising dramatically. Before the start of the tollway’s construction, the price of land in the area was at P500 per square meter. In January last year, the price has gone up to P5,000 per square meter.

The economic ripple effect keeps expanding, attracting the attention of investors, including some of the country’s biggest conglomerates. Ayala Corp. and SM Prime Holdings Inc., for instance, have put up a consortium that will build a 16,000-seater convention center in South Road Properties. Ayala Land Inc., the property-developer arm of the Ayala Group, has launched a prime commercial project called District Square that will be located within the seaside South Coast City on Cebu City’s South Coastal Road. The Gokongwei Group, which traces its roots to Cebu, is reportedly eyeing the gaming business potential of the Queen City of the South.

The Cebu toll bridge project is MPTC’S first investment foray in the Visayas. Considered as the Philippines’s largest toll road developer and operator, MPTC operates the North Luzon Expressway, the Subic-clark-tarlac Expressway, the Cavite Expressway and the Cavite-laguna Expressway. It is currently building the Nlex Connector, which is expected to speed up traffic from Nlex to the South Luzon Expressway. MPTC also manages expressways in Indonesia and Vietnam with local tollway concessionaires in the two Asean countries.