Work starts on P683M underpass project; heavy southbound traffic seen

TRAFFIC is expected to be heavy for southbound motorists now that the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) 7 has started the construction of the P683 million underpass project along N. Bacalso Ave. in Cebu City.

DPWH project engineer Roy Dela Cruz said their contractor, WT Construction Inc., already initiated the construction of the drainage line, a component of the project, last Saturday near the Mambaling flyover and skywalk.

“The drainage line will connect the runoff water from the drainage in F. Llamas St. We started mobilizing the contractor’s equipment last Saturday,” Dela Cruz told reporters.

Dela Cruz and other DPWH-7 officials attended the Cebu City Council’s regular session yesterday afternoon and presented details of the project and its implementation to the Council members.

Because of the construction of the drainage line, the contractor had utilized two of the three lanes of the southbound side of N. Bacalso Ave. near the Mambaling flyover.

And this, according to Cebu City Transportation Office (CCTO) operations chief Francisco Ouano, has caused heavy traffic in the area yesterday morning.

“Our agreement was that they will only use one lane, but they used two lanes. It caused heavy traffic since the vehicles from the flyover and those coming from under the flyover going south will converge in only one lane,” he said.

Ouano said they will be meeting with the DPWH and the contractor today to discuss this concern and see if there is a need to ask the latter to just work on the drainage line at night in order to avoid causing heavy traffic in the area.

A backhoe and dump truck are among the equipment that have been placed on the road for the drainage line construction.

Although construction of the drainage line has already started, Ouano said the CCTO has not yet implemented the rerouting scheme for public utility jeepneys (PUJ) in the area.

This is because the drainage line construction has not yet reached the area in front of McDonald’s Mambaling and the DPWH, and its contractor has also not yet finished the patching works for the alternative roads which was one of the conditions set by the CCTO before the first phase of the construction will be allowed to start.

Dela Cruz said that patching and asphalting works on the alternative roads were delayed due to bad weather in the past days.

“The patching works for Tagunol Street was scheduled to start last Saturday but we could not do it due to the weather. We target to start it by tomorrow,” he said.

After Tagunol St., he said they will also repair the other alternative roads including Ganciang St. and Ma. Gochan St.

He said the DPWH had to shell out an extra P4 million for the patching works since this was not included in the total budget for the underpass project.

During their presentation to the City Council yesterday, DPWH-7 planning division assistant chief Joshua Monsanto said the project construction is expected to take more than 700 days.