DPWH has started sending equipment for rehabilitation of Boracay

Boracay residents, workers and business operators switched off their lights and lit candles or turned on cellphone torches on Saturday, March 17, 2018 to appeal to the government not to shut down the island. (Contributed photo)

Heavy equipment have started rolling into Boracay as April 26 – the starting date of its six-month closure – draws near.

Wenceslao Leaño Jr., the Western Visayas director of the Department of Public Works and Highways, said that the equipment included four dump trucks, two loaders, one backhoe loader and one unit of backhoe.

They would be used to clear road obstructions and repair drainage systems on the island.

“These equipment would be used for the widening of the main road, the Boracay Circumferential Road,” Leaño said.

“There are road obstructions along the sidewalk. Right now, existing roads are very narrow, about four meters-wide. That is why there is often traffic in this area, we aim to widen it to 12 meters so it could be used by both pedestrians and vehicles,” he said.

Leano said the equipment could also be used for other clearing or rehabilitation-related activities on the resort island.

“We would be able to finish our tasks in six month-time if there would be no problems in the road right-of-way, and if the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) would give us the go signal to demolish everything,” he said.

President Rodrigo Duterte had ordered the resort island’s six-month closure following a recommendation from the Department of Tourism, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, and the Department of the Interior and Local Government.

Duterte, who described the isalnd as a “cesspool,” said the closure would allow rehabilitation of the 1,032-hectare island. /atm