MNTC earmarks $400M for new NLEx sections

Manila North Tollways Corp. (MNTC) has earmarked $400 million for the development of three new sections of the North Luzon Expressway (NLEx).

The new sections to be located in various parts of Metro Manila will make NLEx, the country’s oldest toll road, more accessible to the 160,000 vehicles that use the road daily.

Construction of these sections, which involve 20 kilometers of new roads, will start next year and will be completed within three years, MNTC president Rodrigo Franco said.

About P2 billion will be spent for the section that will link the Caloocan-Malabon-Navotas-Valenzuela (Camanava) area to the recently completed Mindanao Avenue cloverleaf.

Franco said P8 billion would be used to build an elevated section of the road linking NLEx to the C3 road, while the biggest of the projects—worth P10 billion—involves the construction of a link between NLEx and C5.

He said the projects would be funded with a combination of debt and internally generated funds. He said MNTC would tap more funding next year.

In the meantime, Franco said MNTC was planning to raise next year the toll rates at NLEx by 11 percent, subject to the approval of the Toll Regulatory Board (TRB).

“Revenue growth next year may hit more than 10 percent if we can get a tariff increase,” Franco told reporters.

For this year, he said revenue from fees collected from motorists using the NLEx would likely grow by 2 percent.

He said revenue and vehicle volumes grew by more than 3 percent in the first half, but the bad weather and flooding experienced in August dragged down the company’s year-to-date growth rates.

MNTC is a wholly-owned unit of Metro Pacific Tollways Corp., the toll road subsidiary of Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC).

MPIC, led by Manuel V. Pangilinan, is the local unit of Hong Kong’s First Pacific Co. Ltd.