THE GOVERNMENT has awarded three contracts for the North-South Commuter Railway (NSCR) project to two joint ventures (JVs) of multinational firms, with a total cost of P52 billion, the Transportation department said on Thursday.
The three civil works contract packages, which were signed on Thursday, encompass the 14.9 kilometers of the NSCR’s rail viaducts and stations, the department said in a statement.
Two contracts, Packages 1 and 3c, were awarded to the joint venture of Indonesian firms PT Adhi Karya (Persero) Tbk. and PT PP (Persero) Tbk. (Adhi-PT PP JV).
Package 1, with a contract price of P11.29 billion and $6.88 million inclusive of provisional sums and value-added tax, encompasses the construction of a 1.2-kilometer (km) railway viaduct structure and the Blumentritt Station, which will be connected to the existing Blumentritt Station of the Light Rail Transit Line 1.
Meanwhile, Package 3c, valued at P15.75 billion and $49.52 million, involves the construction of 5.8 km of at-grade and viaduct railway track structure, which includes elevated stations at Bicutan and Sucat.
Package 3a was awarded to Leighton Contractors (Asia) Ltd., the Hong Kong-based unit of Australia’s CIMIC Group Ltd., in partnership with Philippine company First Balfour, Inc.
The contract package comprises the construction of 7.9 km of at-grade and viaduct railway track structure, including an elevated station at Buendia and at-grade stations at EDSA and Senate, with a value of P21.39 billion and $19.42 million.
“With the signing of these three contract packages that cover a total of around 14.9 kilometers of at-grade and railway viaduct structures, we will be a step closer to our goal of serving around 800,000 commuters daily in 2029,” President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. said. He led the contract signing ceremony at Malacañang.
The contractors must be able to build with the least disruption to Metro Manila’s already chaotic daily routine, according to Transportation Secretary Jaime J. Bautista.
“We want to impress on the contractors the importance of meeting schedules so the whole NSCR project can be completed as promised,” he said.
The NSCR project, with a total funding of P873.6 billion, is co-financed by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
According to the breakdown provided by the Department of Transportation, JICA will contribute P369.27 billion, ADB will fund P329.55 billion, and the Philippine government is expected to raise P174.78 billion.
The civil works for the contracts are anticipated to begin between the fourth quarter of 2023 and the first quarter of next year.
The 147-km NSCR project aims to connect Clark Pampanga and Calamba, Laguna, seamlessly linking Metro Manila to its neighboring provinces.
Once operational, the entire NSCR system is expected to reduce travel time between Clark and Calamba to just two hours, significantly shorter than the current four to 4.5 hours. — Justine Irish D. Tabile
