PPA to open largest passenger terminal

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) will open the largest passenger terminal in the country by March, as the agency gears up for the expected boom in demand for sea travel during the summer season.

PPA general manager Jay Santiago said yesterday the expanded passenger terminal building of the Port of Calapan in Oriental Mindoro would open by March.

Santiago said the expansion project worth P353 million has reached 98 percent completion and is scheduled to be finished by Feb. 18 barring any delays.

Afterward, Santiago said the PPA would unveil the new terminal by March, with the hope of inviting President Marcos and Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista as guests. The PPA scheduled the opening for March in time for the summer surge of travelers going on vacations.

Upon completion, the Port of Calapan will host the largest passenger terminal in the Philippines. The expansion would quadruple the capacity of the port to serve travelers at any given period to 3,500, from 800 prior, according to the PPA.

However, Santiago in December said the passenger terminal building in the Port of Calapan would soon be dwarfed by the capacity of the facility being built at the Port of Zamboanga.

In 2021, the Department of Transportation (DOTr) invested P316 million to broaden the backup area and the pier facilities at the Port of Zamboanga.

Likewise, the DOTr used the budget to build a new passenger terminal in the port, set to be the largest in the Philippines with its design capacity of holding 4,500 passengers at any given time.

“The next terminal that we will inaugurate will be the one in Calapan, Oriental Mindoro. This will be the biggest terminal building when it opens, but only for a short while. After that, it will be the one in Zamboanga. That will ultimately be the biggest,” Santiago said.

The PPA chief said the government would keep on building large-scale passenger terminals across the archipelago, especially along the nautical highway. The PPA plans to open the new facilities of the Port of Zamboanga within the year.

For 2023, Santiago said passenger volume facilitated by ports may climb by about 20 percent, as demand for sea travel goes up.

Pending full year data, passenger traffic in domestic ports tripled to 15.72 million as of the third quarter of 2022 from 4.71 million during the same period in 2021 due to the resurgence of demand for sea travel.