Western Visayas Mega Projects: Who Pays, Who Gains

By Francis Allan L. Angelo

The Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH)’s 2026 budget push for the Panay-Guimaras-Negros bridges, the Iloilo-Capiz-Aklan Expressway (ICAEX), and the Boracay Bridge is being sold as a simple promise: shave travel time, lift tourism, and let Region VI finally move like one economy.

The money is real, too, from PHP 443.5 million in government counterpart funding for the Panay-Guimaras-Negros project to the PPP support funds that explicitly list both ICAEX and the Boracay Bridge projects.

On paper, the upside is real, because faster roads and stronger links can cut logistics friction, improve emergency response, and widen markets for farmers and small producers.

ICAEX, for instance, is pitched as a four-lane controlled-access road that could turn an Iloilo-to-Boracay trip into something closer to a routine drive than an all-day commitment.

The PGN bridges are pitched even bigger, as physical integration across islands that have long functioned like separate economies.

DPWH’s 2026 allocation includes PHP 443.5 million in counterpart funding for the 32.47-kilometer PGN project, which it describes as foreign-assisted and financed largely through concessional loans from South Korea’s EDCF via Korea Eximbank.

If we stop the conversation there, we miss the harder part, which is who gets the first, biggest upside, and who is asked to absorb the first, biggest disruption.

But this is exactly why the basic question has to be asked in plain terms: the region gets connectivity, but the region also absorbs the costs.

The winners, early on, are usually predictable, including tourism hubs that can charge more for “easy access,” landowners near interchanges, and developers who know where the next growth nodes will form.

The losers can be just as predictable, including communities facing price spikes, roadside towns that inherit heavier traffic without services to match, and workers whose livelihoods are built on the current transport ecosystem.

The Boracay Bridge debate exposes that imbalance in the sharpest way, because convenience for visitors can mean disruption for people who keep the Caticlan-Boracay link working every day.

An expressway that cuts the Iloilo-to-Boracay trip to roughly 2.5 hours will be a gift to logistics, resorts, and anyone whose calendar is ruled by weekends and turnover.

It will also be a gift to land near interchanges, where prices rarely stay modest once “controlled-access” becomes a line item.

Meanwhile, the public-facing costs tend to show up as crowded utilities, strained roads beyond the corridor, and local governments left holding maintenance and enforcement obligations long after the launch banners come down.

Boracay is where this trade-off gets painfully specific, because the island already operates under a government-stated carrying capacity of 19,215 persons per day and a daily tourist arrivals cap of 6,405.

Even with those numbers on paper, Boracay’s carrying capacity has been breached during peak periods, which should be a warning light, not background noise, for any project designed to make access easier.

This is also why the “consultation gap” is not a talking point but a legitimacy test, especially for a project that can reorder livelihoods and ecosystems in a single concession.

Aklan Gov. Jose Enrique “Joen” Miraflores has been blunt that consultations were promised and that his province is still waiting for the schedule, which is not the posture of a host LGU that feels like a partner.

He has also said, more plainly, “We haven’t been consulted about it,” and that alone should stop the habit of treating local buy-in as a box to tick after the national plan is already rolling.

Accountability here has names and offices: DPWH for pushing procurement, the PPP Center and economic managers for gating approvals, and LGUs for putting their positions in writing and defending them with evidence.

There is another accountability wrinkle worth saying out loud, because the 2026 budget provision lists the Boracay Bridge projects under PPP support while also stating the fund should not be used for unsolicited projects, and the public deserves clarity on how that rule is being applied.

On procurement, DPWH has said no rival bids were submitted in the comparative challenge period, putting San Miguel Holdings Corp. in a strong position to win a project valued at PHP 8.01 billion.

That may be efficient for timelines, but it raises the burden on government to prove the safeguards are not an afterthought when competition is thin.

The fair way forward is not “build” versus “don’t build,” but build with measurable public outcomes that can be audited, like freight-cost reductions, emergency response benchmarks, and service reliability on the mainland and the island.

DPWH and the proponent should be required to publish the environmental and hydrodynamic studies in full, publish a consultation calendar with attendance and minutes, and publish a tourism-and-utilities management plan that treats the 6,405 arrivals cap as a constraint, not a suggestion.

And if the bridge proceeds, the deal should carry a legally binding transition fund that prepares boatmen and other affected workers for new jobs before displacement happens, because “just compensation” should not be reserved for land alone.

Zoom out and the bigger picture is even clearer, because PGN plus ICAEX is not just a travel-time story but a redesign of how the region moves goods, labor, and capital.

That kind of physical integration can help stabilize food supply chains and reduce some transport costs, but it will also raise vehicle volume, emissions, and roadside land conversion pressures.

Western Visayas cannot sleepwalk into a “Mega Manila” pattern where growth concentrates, traffic worsens, and local ordinances are always playing catch-up.

The most realistic way forward is not to freeze projects forever, but to force the state and proponents to price in the human and environmental transitions up front.

First, DPWH and the PPP Center should publish a dated consultation calendar and a complete disclosure pack that includes hydrodynamic, biodiversity, and carrying-capacity implications in plain language, not just technical annexes.

Second, any Boracay Bridge concession should legally mandate a transition fund, with measurable targets, to retrain and redeploy affected transport workers before the first pile is driven.

Third, “just compensation” should not be treated as a land-only concept, because displacement also happens to labor, and that cost is currently being ignored even when budgets exist for project support.

Fourth, ICAEX and PGN should be tied to social outcomes that can be audited, including freight cost indicators, disaster logistics benchmarks, road safety targets, and equitable access metrics for towns that are not on the main interchange map.

Finally, LGUs should put their demands in writing now, including enforceable traffic management, utilities upgrading plans, and a Boracay access policy that respects the cap instead of daring regulators to look away.

Connectivity can be a public good, but only if the public is treated as a partner in the plan, not a problem to be managed after the contracts are signed.