Illustrative image (Source: highways.today) Hanoi (VNA) - The Philippines has allocated 96.2 billion pesos (roughly 1.98 billion USD) to advance the country's railway system, including the 36-km Metro Manila subway, a lawmaker of that country said on August 31.
Representative Luis Campos, the House Appropriations Committee vice chairman, said the total capital outlay is included in the 4.5 trillion pesos national budget for 2021 submitted by the Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte to the congress last week.
Campos said the subway project in the Southeast Asian country's capital is getting a 34.6 billion pesos in new funding in 2021.
He said the 34.6 billion pesos is on top of the combined 11.3 billion pesos earmarked this year and in 2019 for Phase 1 of the country's first underground commuter train system.
Besides the Metro Manila subway project, a main railway project in Luzon island is getting another 58.6 billion pesos fund, said Campos.
The 147-km railway project will run from Calamba in Laguna province, south of Manila, to New Clark City in Capas, Tarlac province, north of Manila.
The 639-km train will link up Metro Manila to the southern regions in Luzon island, and to cut travel time between Metro Manila and Legazpi City in Albay province from 13 hours to just six hours.
In 2017, the Philippine government proposed to spend 8 to 9 trillion pesos in the next five years to improve the country's public transportation system, including roads, bridges, airports, seaports, and railways./.
VNA
