ILOILO CITY, Iloilo, Philippines (PNA) - The elusive bridge that would link Panay, Guimaras and Negros islands in Central Philippines may remain a dream, a government-sponsored feasibility study said.

Engineer Danilo Peroy, chief of the Planning and Design Division of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) in Western Visayas said the feasibility study on the bridges now rests on his desk even as he expressed fears that the technical report may just gather dust due to unavailability of funds for their construction.

According to Peroy, the aggregated amount for the proposed two bridges has a “colossal” tag price of P53.973 billion, which is certainly a far cry from the previous estimate of R25 billion.

In the feasibility study, the Iloilo City-Guimaras Bridge which traverses a distance of 2.59 kilometers will cost the government R14.173 billion while the bridge across from Guimaras to Negros Occidental which stretches across some 20.6 kilometers is estimated to cost some R40 billion.

Several lawmakers sympathetic with the ambitious plan have made a commitment to look for the needed funds, but Peroy said that until the bankrolling of the whopping amount is officially announced by the government, “the people in region 6 will have no choice to but to continue to view the grandiose blueprint as wishful thinking.”