Metro Manila subway digging to start before year ends

July 25,2019

An official rendering of a Metro Manila subway train.

INITIAL excavation works for the construction of the Metro Manila subway will start in late 2019.

Department of Transportation (DOTr) undersecretary for finance Gary de Guzman said earlier this week that the country’s first underground railway was among the various projects aimed at easing traffic congestion in Metro Manila, according to a report posted Wednesday in the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

The construction of Metro Manila subway is one of the largest projects under the government’s “Build, Build, Build” infrastructure program. The project costs P350 billion, the Inquirer said.

“We will start actual excavation by the fourth quarter of this year,” de Guzman was quoted by the Inquirer as saying during a briefing held a day after President Rodrigo Duterte’s fourth State of the Nation Address.

The DOTr had led a groundbreaking ceremony for the Metro Manila subway project in February. The agency said initial drilling will start in 2020 once the assembly of a tunnel boring machine is completed.

The DOTr and Japanese contractors, including design and construction giant Shimizu Corp., are currently overseeing the assembly of the boring machine, which will clear a path for the 36-kilometer underground train that will run from Quezon City to Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport in Pasay City.

De Guzman was quoted in the Inquirer report as saying that the DOTr was hoping to finish the first three subway stations, namely Mindanao Avenue, North Avenue and Tandang Sora, in late 2022.

Other stations planned are in Quezon Avenue, East Avenue, Anonas, Kaptipunan, Ortigas North, Ortigas South, Kalayaan Avenue, Bonifacio Global City, Cayetano Boulevard and the Food Terminal, Inc. complex. The DOTr will be fully completed by 2025.

Disclaimer: The comments uploaded on this site do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of management and owner of Cebudailynews. We reserve the right to exclude comments that we deem to be inconsistent with our editorial standards.