(PNA Bacolod file photo)
BACOLOD CITY – Mayor Evelio Leonardia said more growth centers will rise across the city, where several structures are being constructed and planned for various purposes.
“We want to spread the development of Bacolod. We don’t want to get crowded [in one area],” Leonardia said in an interview on Friday.
Growth Center means areas with the potential to grow and accommodate the growth, and to pursue orderly development.
These areas are situated in properties donated by prominent families for use by the local government, totaling 18 hectares of prime properties, the latest of which is the four-hectare land in Barangay Vista Alegre donated by the Gensoli family.
The Yanson family also provided 8.9 hectares in the southern part of the city, where the new south terminal and the MassKara coliseum and city museum are being constructed.
Previously, the Gonzaga family also donated five hectares along Circumferential Road, where the Bacolod City Government Center is now located.
In the Vista Alegre property, the Teofilo M. Gensoli Memorial Medical Center will be established in honor of the family's patriarch.
It will have two main components, including a bigger, more modern City Health Office (CHO) that will be built using local government funds, and the Bacolod City General Hospital, whose construction will be funded by the national government.
The new CHO will have a dialysis center, birthing facility, and dental clinic with state-of-the-art medical equipment.
Leonardia said the construction of the medical complex will provide jobs to many Bacolodnons, and open other livelihood opportunities for communities around the area.
“It will certainly become a growth center, a beehive of economic activity,” he added.
The mayor said another growth center is the area surrounding the almost nine hectares of prime land donated by the Yanson family along barangays Alijis and Tangub, where the new south terminal, as well as the coliseum and museum, will soon rise.
These structures are seen as the key to increased economic activities to boost further development of the south.
Adjacent to the Bacolod City Government Center are areas that have been transformed into a commercial district and lifestyle and nightlife centers in recent years.
Megaworld’s Upper East mixed use complex, currently under construction, is also located across the Government Center grounds. (PNA)
