MANILA, Philippines — Food-to-infrastructure giant San Miguel Corp. (SMC) plans to include a bus rapid system and active transport facilities in the revised design of the controversial Pasig River Expressway (PAREX).
In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, SMC confirmed reports it is reviving its interest in building a toll road above Pasig River, backpedaling on an earlier decision to scrap the project in deference to growing opposition.
On first thought, it didn’t seem that bad of an idea. Manufacturing and industry-based businesses in the western Rizal area (Montalban, San Mateo, Antipolo, Cainta, Taytay, Tanay, etc) needs access to the port of Manila. That then leads me to thinking there must have already been a plan for such a highway (like NLEX, SLEX, and C6).
However, the devil is in the details. Why would it need to be near the Pasig river? Couldn’t they have adopted an existing alignment? Aurora Avenue comes to mind, but it’s too narrow west of EDSA. An alignment based on Shaw Boulevard could have been nice, but it doesn’t even reach Rizal, it’d have to cut through already-built-up area west of Manggahan floodway if it has hopes of reaching Manila East Road. So, Metro Manila is already too crowded for a major east-west corridor for transporting goods.
How about using the river itself! No, not a highway over the river, but using cargo barges to carry goods from Rizal perhaps via facilities in Tanay, Cainta/Taytay, Pasig, Makati, Manila and then a separate facility next to the port. And then if it works, it can be extended via a different route coming from Laguna. It’s already there, and perhaps there wouldn’t be any induced demand.
Of course, it would be hard to connect with the C6, NLEX, and SLEX projects, which might be the point all along. Also, there might be issues with how navigable Pasig river and Laguna de Bay would be to barges of a certain capacity.
I don’t know, that’s why things like this should have been planned by the government decades in advance, and with expert help from the likes of JICA and others, in light of future projections and policy.