The Metro Pacific group said it expects to receive the original proponent status for an unsolicited proposal to build a P92-billion toll road, including a tunnel below Rizal Park, to link North Luzon Expressway and Manila-Cavite Expressway. NLEx Corp. president Luigi Bautista said the firm submitted the proposal on NLEx-Cavitex Port Expressway Link to the Public Works Department in 2018. The project is expected to decongest traffic in the Manila Bay area. “We submitted it last year. They [Public Works Department officials] are doing the usual review of the documents and design. After the exercise, it’s going to be OPS, hopefully, this year,” Bautista said. Bautista said a component of the project is a tunnel expressway that would be built between Rizal Park and the US Embassy. He said this would make the project a “challenge” to them. “It’s really a big project. I think they are supportive of the project,” he said. The proposed NLEx-Cavitex Port Expressway, which was jointly submitted by NLEx and Cavitex Infrastructure Corp., is a 15-kilometer toll road with six lanes (2x3 configuration) with elevated and tunnel portions from NLEx Segment 10 up to Cavitex. This would provide an ideal truck route directly linked to Manila’s Port Area. The first phase of the project will stretch from C3 Road to Anda Circle (5.7 kilometers) while the second phase is a connection from Cavitex to Buendia (4.8 kilometers) and the last phase from Buendia Ave. to Anda Circle (4.6 km). The project will reduce truck traffic within its limited capacity road network and significantly contribute to the decongestion of the metropolis, according to MPTC.Cavitex is a 14-kilometer toll expressway linking Manila to the southern province of Cavite. MPTC is also building the NLEx-SLEx Connector Road, an eight-kilometer, four-lane toll road linking the North Luzon Expressway and South Luzon Expressway, passing through Metro Manila and using the existing Philippine National Railway alignment as its route. The group is also constructing the P35-billion Cavite Laguna Expressway, a four-lane, 47-kilometer closed-system toll expressway connecting Cavitex and South Luzon Expressway. The expressway will start from Cavitex in Kawit, Cavite and end at the South Luzon Expressway-Mamplasan Interchange in Biñan, Laguna. MPCALA Holdings Inc. earlier secured an OPS from the Public Works Department to build Cavite-Tagaytay-Batangas Expressway, a 46-kilometer road worth P25.24 billion. The project will link Cavite Expressway and Cavite Laguna Expressway in Silang, Cavite to Tagaytay City and will terminate in Nasugbu, Batangas.