THE Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH)-Davao assured that they will open a portion of the Coastal Road for the motorists early next year to address traffic concerns in Ulas and Puan, Davao City.

In an interview Tuesday, August 27, with DPWH Davao Region chief information officer Dean Ortiz, he said for this year, they are still in the process of looking for a possible exit in the Talomo area. Since there is already a bridge in the area going to Central Park, it would mean an alternate route especially for people coming from the south particularly from the Toril area.

“Usually ang traffic is situated sa Puan and Ulas. If they use the Coastal Road, they would no longer have to pass through those traffic gridlocks so diretso na sila sa Bangkal na area,” Ortiz said.

Ortiz added, “Siguro by next year, that can be a possibility na. If it involves the opening of a new road, then that would take time. Of course, for existing roads, we still have to widen them. Most probably by early next year, we will have that accessed.”

The P26-billion coastal road project in Davao City is targeted to be completed by 2021. The coastal road begins in Bago Aplaya and ends at the Azuela Cove.

“Per instruction by the secretary, as soon as we have finished the Bago-Talomo portion of the project, we have to find an exit towards the Talomo area so that would mean that we could already use the road partially up until if we have reached Punta Dumalag then we could also make an opening there. We are planning to open the coastal road progressively to the motoring public,” he added.

Since construction of the coastal road began in 2017, they were able to construct around 2.9 kilometers road. For this year, they are targeting another 1.1 kilometers from Punta Dumalag to Times Beach.

Ortiz said they already broke ground for the portion in Times Beach in Matina area and they have five packages to implement this year. Meanwhile, for the 2017 project, they are already at 94 percent completion, 65 percent for 2018 project, while for 2019 project they are still starting the construction of Package 8 to 12.

The P1.5 billion budget has just been released last July. This will kick start the construction for the five packages. However, the budget was delayed because of the late approval of the General Appropriate Act (GAA) for 2019.