Seventy-four local and foreign firms from 14 countries are reportedly interested in the government’s MRT-3 Capacity Expansion, Operations, and Maintenance (CEOM) Public-Private Partnership (PPP) Project.

The Department of Transportation (DoTr) said Tuesday that the strong turnout at the recent joint market sounding event with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) showed strong interest in transport projects backed by robust ridership demand and solid revenue potential.

Commercially attractive project

Transportation Undersecretary for Railways Timothy John Batan said MRT-3’s daily passenger volume makes the project commercially attractive.

“This MRT-3 PPP is a very viable and promising project. This is an existing line, and historically its ridership has reached 620,000 to 630,000 people a day.”

“In terms of ridership and demand, we are confident that MRT-3 has both, and I think that viability is the reason why so many attended our Market Sounding,” Batan said.

The MRT-3 CEOM PPP project will transfer operations and maintenance of the existing rail line to a private operator while covering major upgrades, additional trains, and capacity expansion to improve commuter experience and system efficiency.

Winning bidder will operate

and maintain MRT-3

Under the arrangement, the winning bidder will operate and maintain MRT-3, manage the line’s segment of the Common Station, deploy Dalian trains for commercial operations, acquire additional rolling stock, and upgrade the signaling, depot, power and communications systems.

ADB country director for the Philippines Andrew Jeffries said the multilateral lender remains committed to supporting the project and improving urban connectivity.

“With this MRT-3 CEOM PPP Project, we’re proud and quite privileged to be a partner of the government of the Philippines in this endeavor to improve the overall connectivity for the Filipino people,” Jeffries said.