Manila Bulletin

Traveling between Metro Manila and Southern Tagalog will soon be a breeze with expected completion of the South Luzon Expressway (SLEX) expansion project before the end of the year, Malacanang said yesterday.

Presidential Management Staff chief Hermogenes Esperon Jr. said President Arroyo has ordered authorities to speed up the completion of 37 infrastructure projects, including the P8.5 Billion-SLEX, to facilitate fast transportation of goods and services at reasonable cost by December 2009.

The progress od the infrastructure development included in the President's State of the Nation Address (SoNA) before a joint session of Congress on July 27, Esperon added.

Of the 154 SoNA infrastructure commitments, Esperon said 38 have already been completed and 37 more will be completed by December 2009.

"Many of these projects are supposed to be completed in 2010, event beyond July 2010. But the President has given instructions as early as last year to rush these projects so we can deliver them by December 2009. That would include the closing of the loop LRT and MRT 1," he said.

SLEX project involves the rehabilitation and upgrading of the existing 28.54 km length of the expressway starting from Alabang Viaduct up to Calamba, Laguna and additional 7.6 km highway to be constructued from Calamba to Sto. Tomas in Batangas that will connect to Southern Tagalog Arterial Road 2.

Based on an inspection of SLEX, Esperon, also co-chairman of the Pro-Performance Team that monitors infrastructure projects, said the Toll Road 1 od the Alabang Viaduct is now 99.8 percent complete.

"The only remaining work are the traffic signs and CCTV cameras," he said.

Esperon also said the concrete paving of Toll Road 2 from Alabang to Calamba has been completed. The toll plazas, will be finished by September 2009. "It will be a little bit higher for the Skyway portion but you can expect the same rates as that in the NLEX," he said.

The Toll Road 3, which link the SLEX to the Southern Tagalog Arterial Road (STAR), will be operational by December 2009, according to Esperon.

"By February or March 2010, it will be fully operational with all the signage, safety facilities, and other things," he said.

- Genalyn Kabiling