Tulaoc

Our problem is not only how to ensure the year-round reliability of our fresh water supply but also how to keep it from submerging our homes.

Should a storm hit us next week, Bulacan and Pampanga will likely be flooded again. Severe weather simply outpaces the infrastructure work that needs to be done.

The private sector is helping where it can. In addition to San Miguel Corporation deploying its dredging equipment to help unclog the rivers in the two rapidly developing provinces, Metro Pacific Tollways Corporation (MPTC) committed to repave the 200-meter stretch of the NLEX that was submerged last week to make it flood-proof. That, however, will be contingent on the DPWH raising the Tulaoc Bridge by 0.7 meters to allow a 4.5-meter clearance for trucks using the expressway.

Presidential adviser on water Rogelio “Babes” Singson is also president of MPTC, the company that operates the NLEX. Singson also served as DPWH secretary.

President Bongbong Marcos looked dismayed when he surveyed the flooded portion of the NLEX last week. This vital piece of infrastructure was built during his father’s time and has become an irreplaceable means for transporting people and goods between Northern Luzon and the NCR. It was designed to be robust and immune to flooding. That was before climate change made severe weather the norm.

While we dealt with flooding in Central and Southern Luzon, our neighbors China and Japan saw unprecedented flooding due to the same weather system that brought us heavy downpours. Millions had to be evacuated.

The elevation of Tulaoc Bridge and the low-lying portion of NLEX near San Simon, Pampanga will be carried out in the next few weeks. NLEX estimates the elevation of the expressway could be done in three months.

The engineering remedy will, hopefully, prevent a repeat of the flooding last week that basically cut the lifeline to the city. Trucks delivering foodstuff and ordinary motorists were stranded on the expressway for many hours.

There now seems to be a consensus to begin building a large water impounding facility at the Candaba Swamp. This has been talked about for years with no real effort to actually begin building it. Today, in the wake of the flooding and facing prospects of severe weather becoming worse, the project could actually begin moving. We have the preliminary numbers to work with.

Singson, who favors the impounding project, proposes that government purchase around 200 hectares of the Candaba Swamp. This is about a tenth of the entire swamp area.

This project will take much longer to complete. Government must first find the money to buy the land. This will probably require a special appropriation by Congress.

Then government will have to convince holders to titles to the swamp land to sell. This might require some hard negotiation with individual landowners.

Remember that the Marcos I government managed to complete both the NLEX and the SLEX under conditions of martial law. An authoritarian government has an easier time convincing individual holdouts about the strategic benefits of large infra projects. Notwithstanding, it took government about four decades to finally connect EDSA to Roxas Boulevard.

Despite the principle of eminent domain, government has had difficulty acquiring right of way for important roadway projects. The Skyway had to snake around to adjust to available rights of way. The expressway running from the SLEX to Silang and then Tagaytay is cut midway because one landowner is holding out.

Right of way issues will continue to hamper the progress of several projects, such as the expressway that will run though Nueva Ecija up to the Cagayan Valley. Another project grappling with right of way issues is the extension of the SLEX to cut through Batangas and onto the Bicol Region. The last I checked, the C-3 road is still cut in the Caloocan area, approaching Dagat-Dagatan, because of one aging factory that refuses to budge.

Flood plain

I never really appreciated how many rivers and tributaries flowed through Central Luzon until I took a close look at the maps Ramon Ang reproduced at San Miguel headquarters.

Ang produced those detailed maps to argue two things: that the New Manila International Airport project was actually sitting on an island surrounded by two rivers and the sea; and that the waterways of the region need a sustained cleanup to prevent future clogging.

Waters from two mountain ranges – the Cordillera and the Sierra Madre – unload into the Central Luzon provinces, making their way to Manila Bay. With the rivers heavily silted and trash-filled and parts of the region experiencing subsidence due to overexploitation of our aquifers for irrigation, add the deforestation of the mountain ranges, flooding will become chronic unless a comprehensive engineering plan for the region is executed immediately.

The airport project itself does not involve creating new land from Manila Bay. It merely repurposes land that was previously used for agriculture and aquaculture. All the land used for this giant development have existing land titles.

The redevelopment of the land is being undertaken with technical support from Dutch engineers. No one could be better than the Dutch at water management. Their whole country was carved from the sea.

The international consultants, particularly Royal Boskalis, ensure that the airport project follows the strictest international standards in environmental and social impacts mitigation. As part of the airport project, San Miguel is implementing a massive river cleanup involving not just the surrounding river systems but, eventually, all the rivers in Bulacan and Pampanga.