The group of businessman Manuel V. Pangilinan is embarking on an ambitious plan to link Luzon’s seaports via dedicated cargo railway lines—a move that it said was good for trade and would help cut road congestion in traffic-strangled Metro Manila.

MRail, a subsidiary of Pangilinan-led Manila Electric Co., would revive a 57-kilometer cargo railway line linking Manila International Container Terminal, controlled by Enrique Razon Jr.’s International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI), to ICTSI’s inland container terminal facility in Laguna.

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MRail president Ferdinand Inacay told reporters in a briefing Wednesday the P10-billion project would be a venture between MRail and ICTSI. A “well-known” Asian freight operator would also be tapped as technical partner, he said.

The Manila-Laguna cargo railway was initially operated by ICTSI between 1998 and 2003. It was discontinued mainly because of viability issues.

Inacay said the firm was also studying cargo railway projects linking Manila to the Clark Freeport Zone. The line would eventually be extended to Subic in the north and to Batangas Port in the south.

He said MRail was also keen on participating in the government’s call for a Mindanao Rail Network.

“Once you have an Asean integration … we will be competing within Asean. If you cannot bring your goods, or send your goods out efficiently, you will be eaten alive,” Inacay said. “So the way we enable ourselves to compete with them is to have a good logistics and transport system. This is not a cure-all but one of those that can help us compete.”

The Manila-Laguna railway project will be using the existing tracks of the Philippine National Railways. The project is expected to be done by end-2018.

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