The PNR South Long Haul, also known as the PNR Bicol, is a proposed inter-city rail line project in southern Luzon, Philippines. It is part of the larger Luzon Rail System, a network of long-distance standard-gauge lines being built by the Philippine National Railways (PNR) throughout Luzon. It is one of the two lines to reconstruct the historic PNR South Main Line, along with the electrified North–South Commuter Railway South section to Calamba, Laguna.
The line will initially begin at Banlic station in Calamba, Laguna and terminate at Daraga, Albay. It would have also plan an additional extensions, infill stations, and branch lines. The masterplan line shall connect passengers from Sucat station in Muntinlupa to either the Batangas International Port, Legazpi, Albay, or Matnog, Sorsogon. Freight trains will also serve the line and there will be an eventual extension of the line to the Port of Manila.
The project was estimated to cost ₱175 billion (US$3.45 billion) and financing for the line was originally supposed to be supported by Chinese official development assistance, which was later withdrawn in 2023. Construction for the line has been postponed for various reasons. The line was to be partially operable between San Pablo and Lucena by 2025, and the first phase between Banlic and Daraga would be fully opened by 2027. After China's withdrawal of loans, the government is still waiting to find new sources of financing and have discussions with other countries. As of 2025, pre-construction work is still in progress.
History Background
The South Main Line was first proposed in 1875 as part of the plan for the Luzon railway network. The line was first opened as the Main Line South in 1916 and its first named service was the Lucena Express to Lucena, Quezon. The Bicol Express opened three years later in 1919. Several more segments were constructed into Quezon province and the Bicol Region, including a new line called the Legazpi Division. The two sections were then connected by a train ferry until the completion of the line in 1938. On May 8, 1938, the two sections were officially linked with President Manuel L. Quezon hammering the golden spike at Del Gallego, Camarines Sur.
Around those same years, the first standard-gauge railway in the Philippines was opened in Camarines Norte by the Dahican Lumber Company. The company used three geared steam locomotives acquired second-hand from the United States. Therefore, this was not under the Manila Railroad network which ran on narrow gauge which is still in intermittent use today.
During its peak in 1941, the line also had branches in Batangas as the Batangas City line and eastern Laguna province as the Pagsanjan line. The line was also known to carry mixed trains as late as 1968, when PNR operated a short-lived refrigerated car service carrying produce with the 1968 eruption of the Mayon Volcano being the cause of its cancellation. According to the PNR, post-war services peaked between the late 1960s and the early 1970s, and the South Main Line enjoyed a daily ridership of 7,560 passengers being carried by 36 passenger railcars.
Ridership eventually declined as buses became the favored transit mode out of Metro Manila. The new Maharlika Highway system was being built around the country starting in the 1970s which accelerated the demise of rail travel. Its northern counterpart was closed in 1997, and the South Main Line continued to operate as the sole inter-city rail line in the Philippines. After a derailment in Padre Burgos, Quezon in 2004 made the Philippine National Railways to cancel all intercity services until 2011, when both the Bicol Express to Legazpi and the Isarog Limited to Naga returned to service. The services were short-lived and were terminated again the following year after a derailment in nearby Sariaya, and services were intermittent since then. The Aquino administration purchased rail ties to rehabilitate the rails in the area of Hondagua station in 2015 as part of the first South Main Line rebuild, but the ties were left to rot on the yards of a train station in Muntinlupa by 2019.
During the enhanced community quarantine in Luzon, the South Main Line was used to carry so-called locally-stranded individuals or people stranded outside their hometown during the lockdowns. They were sent home on express trains to the Bicol Region under the Balik Probinsya, Bagong Pag-asa (lit. Return to the Country Side, New Hope) program.
Development The first mention of an extension of the South Main Line to Sorsogon province in contemporary times was in 1996 when the Japan International Cooperation Agency mentioned an extension of the line to Matnog. An earlier extension to Sorsogon however was mentioned as early as 1962 as part of the Cagayan Valley Railroad Extension Project for the PNR North Main Line, and then made into law as part of Republic Act 6366 enacted by Ferdinand Marcos on August 16, 1971.
By 2015, a proposal was presented to PNR and will be built as-is. The narrow gauge line would have had a maximum speed of . The 2015 plan would have been bundled with the initial 2015 North–South Commuter Railway plan and would be funded as a public-private partnership as part of the North-South Railway Project. However, the auction was called off in November 2016.
Under Chinese proposal Another proposal was approved on September 12, 2017, as a standard-gauge line. The new standard-gauge line was announced in 2018 and would have had a maximum speed of . In 2019, the line is announced to have a maximum speed of and the new Bicol Express train will have an average speed of . The line was initially set to fully open by 2026.
In December 2019, PNR ordered 3 diesel multiple unit trainsets from CRRC Zhuzhou Locomotive, expandable to 21. The order was cancelled in February 2021 due to the latter's failure to submit post-bid documents.
It was later mentioned on September 2, 2021, that the unused sections of the old PNR South Main Line will be reconstructed as branch lines and/or feeder lines to the South Long Haul line.
The bidding for the design and build contract for the project was opened in June 2021. In November 2021, the joint venture of China Railway Group Limited, China Railway No. 3 Engineering Group Co., Ltd, and China Railway Engineering Consulting Group Co., Ltd. (CREC JV) qualified for the contract and was subsequently awarded the contract on December 2, 2021. The contract was signed by the Department of Transportation and the CREC joint venture on January 17, 2022.
In July 2022, the project funding by China for the project was withdrawn after the Chinese government failed to act on the funding requests by the Duterte administration, along with the funding for the Subic–Clark Railway (later Subic–Clark–Manila–Batangas Railway under a new initiative) and Mindanao Railway projects. Negotiations were restarted in August after Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian and Transport Secretary Jaime Bautista held formal talks ending in an agreement to restart negotiations for the three railway projects. However, negotiations between the two countries broke down, prompting the withdrawal of its loan application on November 6, 2023. Bautista also says that Beijing has lost interest, but this is not linked to South China Sea tensions.
According to a report earlier in July before China's withdrawal, the extension of the expressway in the Bicol region is economically viable. Also, some of the projects, including this railway, are not viable and feasible.
Attempts on finding funders After China's withdrawal, other funders have discussed financing the project, but no further details have been revealed. The causes of the project's delay include affected informal settlers, a lack of construction and funding, and the relocation of families, which began in October 2023.
According to international relations and security expert Lucio Pitlo III, saying “under the present state of bilateral ties, it’s really hard to see progress on such financing so looking for alternative sources makes sense.”
In November 2023, DOTr Secretary Jaime Bautista announced that India, Japan, and South Korea have offered to finance the three railway projects, including the PNR South Long Haul. On March 12, 2024, the Asian Development Bank (ADB), a lender that also provided the funding for the two sections of the North–South Commuter Railway (NSCR), was in talks with National Economic and Development Authority to finance the project. In the following month, Bicol Saro party-list Rep. Brian Raymund Yamsuan announced that Japan would be viable to fund the project.
In July of that year, it was revealed that it may likely end up borrowing from the ADB and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) to rebuild the Bicol Express through the SLH. In August, NEDA Secretary Arsenio Balisacan said it could be that the World Bank, ADB, Japan, India, and Korea have offered the project.
In January 2025, however, according to an interview on Ted Failon at DJ Chacha sa True FM, Jeremy Regino, the DOTr undersecretary for railways, said the project could not have funding yet. He said the DOTr failed to secure enough funding in the 2025 General Appropriations Act (GAA) to undertake the preparatory works for the project, making it challenging to acquire the right of way. France also offered the project in April.
According to The Philippine Star, a report to DOTr Secretary Vince Dizon: “Yes, these projects remain in the priority list of the President and in the priority list of the DOTr. However, it is difficult to say if we don’t have the funding yet. We cannot program a timeline for them,”. Following Dizon's appointment by the Commission of Appointments (COA), Luis Raymund Villafuerte, the representative for Camarines Sur's 2nd district, disclosed that the project has transformed into a high-speed rail system, akin to Japan's Shinkansen, shifting from an ordinary train system.
In August, it was announced that funding from the United States for specific parts of the railway was proposed, and while the amount fell short, it could potentially provide additional resources to move families.
A year later, the PNR pitched the project to American investors during the US–Philippines Rail Technology Exchange. Prior to this, the PNR had also held discussions with the commercial team of the United States Embassy to gauge interest, as well as Taiwanese private companies exploring a public-private partnership (PPP) model that would bundle rail development with land-use rights.
To maintain the project's viability and prevent encroachment, the PNR opened bidding in July 2026 for a right of way fencing contract covering the San Pablo, Laguna segment. The 190-day fencing project was designed as a proactive measure to protect the cleared alignment from informal settlers, trespassing, and vandalism while permanent construction funding was being finalized. In September 2026, the project does not allocated through 2027 national budget.
Despite several setbacks, the government is pressing forward with its infrastructure agenda, notably the () rehabilitation of the Maharlika Highway. This initiative was announced by Secretary of Public Works and Highways Vince Dizon, who previously served as the DOTr head. The project is currently slated for completion in 2027.
Other plans In April 2024, the government announced the Luzon Economic Corridor, a plan to link the ports in Subic, Clark, Manila, and Batangas and build an industrial area free of slow traffic and powered by renewable energy, positioned to rival the capital in economic output, and a freight railway that will connect the four ports, further postponing the development of the South Long Haul, and a spur linking to Batangas province is now absorbed by the new railway. It is a planned link that would serve Central Luzon, Metro Manila, and Calabarzon.
Construction