DPWH works to protect Mancatian bridge in Porac
CPublic ITY OF SAN FERNANDO -- The Department of Works and Highways (DPWH) is currently working to stabilize both banks of PasigPotrero River and preserve the existing Mancatian Bridge in Porac, Pampanga.
DPWH Secretary Mark Villar said the countermeasure projects will restrain riverbed degradation and ensure safety by preventing the pile foundations of Mancatian Bridge along Angeles-Porac Road from being further exposed.
“Protecting the bridge is vital in keeping barangay Mancatian connected with the rest of Porac town,” he emphasi zed.
DPWH Undersecretary for Unified Project Management Office (UPMO) Operations Emil Sadain said the construction of dikes and groundsills with stepped dams at downstream of Mancatian Bridge will stabilize the riverbed and reinforce the structural integrity of the 270-meter bridge and protect it from threat of flood inundation and damage to properties.
Sadain together with Pr o j ect Manager Isabelita Manalo recently inspected the ongoing structures implemented by UPMO Flood Control Management Cluster under the Pinatubo Hazard Urgent Mitigation Pr oject .
Designed to fix the riverbed elevation and mitigate scouring by forces of turbulent flow during floods, construction of groundsill 1 including left and right dike is at 80 percent
while groundsill 2 is at 91 percent. Another groundsill project started on February 2021 is now at 21 percent.
To maintain river channel capacity and stability, a 136-lineal meter dike along groundsills across Pasig-Potrero River at the downstream of Mancatian Bridge is being built and is now 96 percent completed.
Also, retrofitting works of dike on both sides of Mancatian Bridge and other related facilities of the bridge are also ongoing at 80 percent which is more than 20 percent ahead of schedule.
“These protective engineering works are based on a 2019 Japan International Cooperation Agency study as structural measures to mitigate damage to the highly susceptible foundation of Mancatian Bridge where regular flow of lahar and water from eastern slope of Mt. Pinatubo brought down through the Pasig-Potrero River,” Sadain explained.
Built on 9 span prestressed concrete deck girder with 1.20-meter diameter bored piles, Mancatian Bridge was completed in 2004 under the Pinatubo Hazard Urgent Mitigation Project Phase 2 and has withstand several earthquakes and lahar onslaught for nearly two decades.
The 9.54-meter wide concrete bridge replaced the old Mancatian Bridge destroyed by the initial lahar onslaught in 1991 and the temporary steel bridge constructed in 1995 that was also washed out during one of the most disastrous lahar events of 1997. (PIA 3)