Construction of Clark International Airport’s (CRK) new terminal building has finally been set into motion.
The Department of Transportation (DOTr), Bases Conversion Development Authority (BCDA), Clark International Airport Corporation (CIAC), and Clark Development Corporation (CDC) led ground-breaking and capsule-laying rites at the airport grounds on December 20, marking the start of the project’s construction.
The ground-breaking ceremony was held a few days after Megawide-GMR Consortium bagged the contract for the engineering, procurement and construction of the CRK expansion project.
Spanning around 100,000 square meters including landside and airside facilities, the new terminal is designed to accommodate an additional eight million passengers every year. It is expected to decongest the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) and spread development to the peripheries.
The project is the first phase of a four-stage overall airport development program that aims to make CRK Asia’s next premier gateway.
The expansion of CRK is also part of a bigger development plan for North and Central Luzon. Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade said that the new terminal will complement other infrastructure projects in the area, namely, Manila-Clark Railway, Subic-Clark Cargo Railway, and the New Clark City.
“Ikakabit po natin ang proyektong ito sa (We’ll link project to) Manila-Clark Railway. Not later than 6 January 2018, we will mobilize the construction of the first segment from Tutuban to Malolos, and hopefully we will complete the entire line to Clark before the end of President Duterte’s term,” Tugade said.
BCDA president Vivencio Dizon is also confident that the new terminal will encourage more people to fly from Clark.
“Before Duterte, there were only seven flights from Clark. Now, there are 200 flights from Clark, and that happened in the first year of the administration,” Dizon said.
Upon assuming office, Tugade encouraged airlines to launch more flights from CRK in order to decongest NAIA. He also transferred some general aviation activities from the main gateway in Manila to CRK.
Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez, who was also present during the ground-breaking ceremony, assured that the delivery of the terminal will not be delayed.
“Before, projects take an average of 30 months under PPP [public-private partnership]. I assure you that this will not happen [with] the infrastructure projects of the Duterte administration,” Dominguez said.
He reported that the CRK expansion project is considered the fastest to be implemented by the national government. The development broke ground just six months after getting the approval of the National Economic and Development Authority Board.
The new CRK terminal is the first hybrid project under the Build Build Build infrastructure program of the Duterte administration. Under the hybrid model, the government will build the infrastructure using its own funds to ensure fast delivery of the project.
Earlier, the venture between the Philippines’ Megawide Construction Corp. and India’s GMR Infrastructure placed a P9.36-billion bid for the engineering, procurement and construction contract of the CRK expansion project, beating four other companies.
“Megawide-GMR was declared as the bidder with the ‘lowest calculated responsive bid’, after passing the post-qualification evaluation phase of the competitive bidding— besting four other bidders for the design, engineering and construction of the new Clark terminal building,” BCDA said.
