The Department of Public of Works and Highways (DPWH), through the Iloilo 2nd District Engineering Office together with the Iloilo Provincial Government and the Municipality of Janiuay, Iloilo conducted palliative / remedial works in Suage River influencing Suage Bridge along Iloilo-Capiz Road (old route) at Janiuay town this weekend.
The scouring on the foundation of one of the abutments of the bridge worsened since August this year and has resulted to the exposure of the steel sheet piles at the collapse of the cut-off wall downstream of the old bridge. The foundation of pier 1 of the Old Suage Bridge, which was damaged during the onslaught of Typhoon Yolanda in the year 2013 sank significantly, causing the pier to tilt towards the new bridge which bended the functional water transmission pipe of Janiuay Water District.
The DPWH and RDC through the Regional Project Monitoring Committee (RPMC) recently met with the representatives of the Presidential Management Staff, National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA), Provincial Government of Iloilo, Environmental Management Bureau (EMB), Municipal Government of Janiuay and the Janiuay Water District to discuss measures in averting the total scouring undermining the structural integrity / further damage to the banks of Suage River and its adjacent slope protection structures of the Suage Bridge.
DPWH will be sealing the gap in between the exposed abutment sheet piles of the old and new bridges. Aside from DPWH’s pay loader, the Provincial Government and the Municipality of Janiuay also provided bulldozer, pay loader and heavy equipment for immediate use in order to divert the flow of the river away from the bridges’ abutment by establishing a pilot channel in the middle. DPWH is requesting the Iloilo Provincial Government and EMB for the immediate stoppage and prohibition of quarrying up to 2-kilometers downstream distance from the said bridge given the severity of the river condition. . “These immediate interventions were taken otherwise, one of the approaches of the New Suage Bridge may collapse and render it impassable to vehicles going to and coming from the nearby towns of Lambunao, Calinog and Bingawan” said OIC-Assistant Regional Director Jose Al V. Fruto.
The said counter measures were conducted after alarming observations were noted during the ocular inspection done by the Regional Project Monitoring Committee of the Regional Development Council (RDC) Region 6 of Janiuay Water District’s water transmission pipe that is attached to the Old Suage Bridge