by Aerol John Pateña/PNA
A portion of the Estrella Service Road will be closed for two years to give way for the repair of the Estrella-Pantaleon Bridge, an official of the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) said.
“Roads in the vicinity of Estrella Bridge will be cleared of illegally-parked vehicles and other obstructions,” MMDA general manager Jose Arturo “Jojo” Garcia said in a press briefing Tuesday in Makati City.
The closure of a stretch of Estrella Service Road from Gumamela Street to J.P. Rizal will start at 11 p.m. of March 23 while the other direction going to Rockwell area will remain open to motorists.
The agency advises motorists coming from Edsa-Rockwell to turn at Gumamela Street, left at Camia Street to J.P. Rizal to destination.
Clearing operations will be conducted starting next Monday on identified alternative roads, including streets of Camia, Gumamela, and Progreso.
“We want to utilize all roads in the vicinity,” Garcia said.
Around 500 vehicles per hour are traversing per direction of the service road, according to the MMDA.
The Estrella-Pantaleon Bridge connecting Makati City and Mandaluyong City has been closed to motorists since January 19 for its widening by the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to four lanes from its present two lanes.
The DPWH estimates that the reconstruction of the bridge will be completed in 2021.
The rehabilitation of the Estrella-Pantaleon Bridge is one of the two bridge projects on the Pasig River — the other being the Binondo-Intramuros span in Manila — that would be funded by China based on development assistance agreements with the Duterte administration.
