DBM releases P50M for Cabanatuan road project

CABANATUAN CITY – President Arroyo has announced that the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) has released an initial P50 million to jump-start the construction of the foreign-assisted P3.457-billion Cabanatuan by-pass road project.

The President made the announcement during a visit at the Fort Magsaysay Military Reservation in Palayan City recently.

The DBM issued the forward obligational authority for the project upon completion of a review.

Teodoro Encarnacion, presidential assistant for public works projects, said the P50 million is only an initial amount so the project could be started while waiting for the loan agreement with the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) to be signed. He said the initial funding could be used to settle right-of-way problems among other concerns of the project.

Mayor Jay Vergara said that the Cabanatuan Bypass will involve construction of a new two-lane 34.35 kilometers of bypass roads spanning the towns of San Leonardo, Sta. Rosa, Cabanatuan and Talavera; construction of 17 bridges, of which eight are permanent bridges about 1,368 linear meters long, including one in this city and one in Sicsican, Talavera.

He said that the Cabanatuan phase of the three-phased project will start construction first.

The Cabanatuan bypass forms part of phase 1 of the Arterial Road bypass project covering Bulacan and Nueva Ecija which also consists of the construction of a new two-lane, 6.6-kilometer long Plaridel Bypass. The Plaridel bypass also involves construction of two access roads about 3.3-kilometer long and a 90-linear meter long interchange.

The two by-passes aim to upgrade the traffic function of the road section from the Sta. Rita, Plaridel (Bulacan) to Cabanatuan City of the Pan-Philippine highway. The Cabanatuan by-pass will be funded largely under the JBIC’s 26th Yen Credit Package. It is covered under the Official Development Assistance (ODA)-JBIC under ODA loan no. PH-P236.

Of the estimated project cost of P3.457-billion, P2.593 billion are loans while the government counterpart amounts to P864 million. — Manny Galvez