VAT proceeds to interconnect LRT 1 to MRT 3

Posted on August 27, 2008

VAT proceeds to interconnect LRT 1 to MRT 3 THE government will use proceeds from the value-added tax (VAT) to fund the long-delayed Light Rail Transit North (LRT) extension project targeted for completion before she steps down in 2010.

The President told reporters in an informal interaction in Clark Free Port that the LRT North extension project, linking the LRT Line 1 end station in Monumento, Caloocan City, to the MRT Line 3 station in North Avenue, will commence civil works next month.

She said she ordered concerned officials to “close the loop” using “VAT revenues” because “a loan takes time.”

Edgardo Pamintuan, Luzon Urban Beltway super region champion, said the President decided to focus on completing the North extension project to link all extant metropolitan railways. She, thus, also “scrapped for the meantime” the other components of the Edsa North Transit (ENT) project.

The ENT was to stretch from North Avenue to Malabon and connect the MRT 3 and the planned MRT 7 via a rail depot, providing a link to the south rail and north rail lines.

Pamintuan said the President wants to see the operation of the MRT-LRT Loop while she is still in office, and to just let her successor deal with the rest of the ENT.

He said the civil works for the project would be carried out as the Light Rail Transit Administration bids out the contract for the electro-mechanical component of the elevated railway. There had been two previous biddings. Both failed.

Article source: Business Mirror
by: Mia Gonzalez
photo by: middlegrey (Flickr)

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