NLEX, SCTEX toll up next year

By Rainier Allan Ronda (The Philippine Star) Updated December 21, 2010 

MANILA, Philippines - Like the South Luzon Expressway (SLEX), toll rates at the North Luzon Expressway (NLEX) and the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway (SCTEX) will also go up on Jan. 1, 2011.

Julius Corpuz, Toll Regulatory Board (TRB) spokesman, said that the board had also given “provisional” approval of the toll fee hike applications by the owner-operators of the NLEX and SCTEX last Friday, the same day they had approved the hefty toll fee hike at the 36-kilometer SLEX.

Corpuz said the approval for the NLEX and SCTEX was “provisional” since the board was set to hold public hearings on the toll hikes but they have already allowed both to start collecting the higher toll rates by Jan. 1.

NLEX and SCTEX are both operated by the Manila North Tollways Corp. (MNTC).

“These are provisionally approved rates which are subject to public hearings,” Corpuz told The STAR, noting that the application for toll fee hikes was filed last Sept. 30.

“TRB reviewed their application and on Nov. 13, they published their notices of application to invite petitioners to file their opposition to TRB and commence public hearing,” he said. “On Dec. 13, we again filed notices in the papers that there will be public hearing on NLEX on Dec. 15 and the SCTEX, Dec. 16.”

Corpuz pointed out that there was only one group opposing the proposed toll fee hike, the Alliance of Concerned Transport Organizations (ACTO), headed by Efren de Luna.

“In the hearing, it was agreed that there’ll be more hearings to follow,” he said.

In the SCTEX hearing, Corpuz said that there was no group that attended the hearing to file their opposition.

With the approval of the NLEX toll hike, toll at the expressway will go up to P2.38 per kilometer for cars and jeepneys from the current P2.12, or P41 from Balintawak in Quezon City to San Fernando in Pampanga.

Light trucks and buses will be paying P5.95 per kilometer, and heavy trucks P7.14.

Over 156,000 motorists use the 84-kilometer tollway every day and up to 180,000 during holidays.

The approved new rate on the Subic-Clark road is P2.67 per kilometer, up from P2 now.

The toll from Tipo in Pampanga to Tarlac will be P243 on cars, jeepneys, pickups, taxis and vans, P485 on trucks and buses, and P728 on heavy trucks.

The average traffic in the 94-kilometer Subic-Clark road is 23,000 daily.

Inevitable

MNTC had earlier pointed out that their bid to raise toll fees at the start of 2011 was the first time for them to do so since they started operating the NLEX in 2005.

It noted that it had even imposed two toll fee reductions since they started operating the tollway after a multi-billion peso rehabilitation.

MNTC’s corporate communications officer Marlene Ochoa said that with the 11.8 percent hike they sought from the TRB, the current toll rate of P2.38 per kilometer would mean that the toll fee for Class 1 vehicles from Balintawak to Santa Ines, Pampanga, which is pegged at P174, would go up to P195.

Ochoa said the NLEX rate for the vehicle class and stretch of NLEX had been P2.48 per kilometer, or P203, in 2005.

On Feb. 10, 2005, Ochoa said the MNTC had granted calls from the government to lower toll fees due to foreign exchange strength of the Philippine peso, reducing the toll rate by 11.6 percent, translating to a toll rate of P2.48 per kilometer, or P180 for Class 1 vehicles for the Balintawak to Santa Ines stretch.

The toll rate was again lowered on July 1, 2008 by 3.1 percent, for the same reasons, translating to a toll rate of P2.13 per kilometer or P174 for Class 1 for that stretch.

However, Ochoa said that looking at the TRB-MNTC formula, there was reason to hike to toll fees due to inflation.

“Since July 2008, the Consumer Price Index rose from 153.9 to 166.8,” Ochoa said.

The owner of the SCTEX, the Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA), which was the one who applied for the tollway’s hike, also noted that it was the first toll fee hike since it opened in 2008.

From the current toll rate of P2 per kilometer, the BCDA sought a 43 percent hike, to P2.87, or an increase from the current P188 for Class 1 vehicles using the whole 94-kilometer stretch of the SCTEX from Subic to La Paz, Tarlac, to more than P269.

Rebert Gervacio, BCDA spokesman for the SCTEX, stressed that the toll hike was necessary to enable them to properly operate and maintain the tollway.

He said the BCDA had refrained from asking for a toll fee hike in 2009 even as they were allowed to ask for toll fee adjustments every year but did not do so.

‘Highway robbery’

The TRB was accused yesterday of “highway robbery” for the impending toll hike in the southern and northern Luzon expressways.

Elmer Labog, Kilusang Mayo Uno chairman, said in hiking toll on Jan. 1, the TRB would be “robbing” workers in Metro Manila and nearby regions of their meager wages.

“Toll fee hikes in the SLEX and NLEX are anti-poor because they will cause increases in the prices of goods that are transported through these highways,” he said.

“These increases are arbitrary because they were undertaken without public hearings with sectors which will be affected and without petitions coming from the private companies handling the expressways.

“They are treacherous because they were simply announced during the Christmas season, when people are already having fun with their families and friends.”

Labog said in approving the toll hikes, the TRB has not fulfilled its mandate as a regulatory body.

“It is obvious from its actions, with the lack of public consultations and petitions on these onerous toll fee hikes, that the Toll Regulatory Board is not a regulatory board.”

Labog said the TRB is a “rubber stamp, a spokesman and an implementor” of the private companies in “milking” Filipino workers.

“We condemn these increases and the TRB’s approval of these,” he said.

“It is clear that its only purpose is to give legitimacy to the dictates of the private companies involved.”

Last Dec. 18, the TRB announced the toll hikes in the Southern Luzon Expressway starting Jan. 1.

Today, the TRB released full-page ads in newspapers announcing the implementation of toll increases in the Northern Luzon Expressway also starting Jan. 1.