P4.7B Panglao airport dev’t still on schedule
IF you think the unusual calm after the heated debates regarding the airport in Panglao is an indication of another government flop, think again.
The lull may be because, as the timetable shows, this time of year, or precisely between February to July, the project’s detailed engineering works would be prepared by project consultants.
And Provincial Legal Officer Handel Lagunay added, “come August to September, bidding for the constructions’ civil works would be posted, bid andf awarded to hit the actual work schedules on the first week of October.”
The Philippine Japan Airports Consultants (Phil-JAC) are expected to complete the detailed engineering works for the P4.7 B Panglao Bohol International Airport Project (PBIAP) in July, Lagunay said.
The Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) funding the project has also approved the negotiated contract amount of P290,226,140 for the specified work, he pressed.
According to him who heads the Capitol liaison office for the multi billion project, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has incorporated Panglao Airport in her grand plan to package Central Visayas as the country’s tourism super region and it would be completed in time when the president ends her term.
Earlier too, Governor Erico Aumentado has proposed P2M master-planning of the island to develop the airport surroundings in the context of an “airport city.”
Bohol local officials claim that a rationalized planning for Panglao deters the uncontrollable building of any vertical infrastructure once the project would be constructed.
The MIAA now funds the Aumentado proposal, which is currently taken care by Palafox and Associates.
Local governments and separate government sources have manifested intent in cost-sharing, news reports in Bohol bared.
In a status report presentation to the technical working group working on the airport project however, Lagunay bared some project schedule readjustments to “realistically accommodate subsequent activities.”
The governor has also shared he wants the airport to be Bohol’s gift to the president on her birthday in April in 2010 and before she expires her term.
But with the re-adjustments, Press Secretary Cerge Remonde, who attended the last coordination meeting in Bohol has said “it should show substantial accomplishment” before her term ends. (rachiu/PIA)
