The first segment of the Cavite-Laguna Expressway has finally opened, providing an alternate route for motorists coming from the South Luzon Expressway and continuing further southwest to bypass Santa Rosa’s busy central business district and reentering just past the PNP-SAF training complex along the Santa Rosa-Tagaytay Highway.

CALAX’s Mamplasan entry point is roughly 150m just past the southbound tollbooth of Mamplasan Exit on SLEX. At the moment, Metro Pacific’s MPCALA Holdings, the project proponent and developer of CALAX, limits the use of the expressway to a single lane on each side with a 60km/h speed limit. The thoroughfare is temporarily toll-free and has operating hours from 6am to 6pm on Sundays to Thursdays, and from 6am to 10pm on Fridays, Saturdays and holidays.

Once completely finished and fully operational, the expressway project aims to provide a faster, safer, more comfortable and more reliable route between Bacoor and Kawit in Cavite, and between Laguna and SLEX—thus enhancing trade and socioeconomic activities around them.

The total project scope involves the financing, the design, the construction, the operation and the maintenance of the entire four-lane, 44.63km closed-system toll expressway connecting the Manila-Cavite Expressway and SLEX. The tollway will start from CAVITEX in Kawit, Cavite, and end at the SLEX-Mamplasan Interchange in Biñan, Laguna. The project will have interchanges in nine locations: Kawit, Daang Hari, Governor’s Drive, Aguinaldo Highway, Silang, Santa Rosa-Tagaytay, Laguna Boulevard, Technopark and a toll barrier before SLEX. The total project cost is P35.43 billion via the public-private partnership between the government and MPCALA, with a build-operate-transfer scheme that’s good for 35 years.

The new world-class expressway will be a welcome treat especially for travelers going home to Cavite, Laguna and Batangas for this All Saints’ Day weekend.