By Leonardo Micua

 

I WAS no longer surprised at all when the DPWH commenced its stalled cutting of overgrown trees, especially mango trees, from Barangay Tebag in Sta. Barbara to Calasiao and up to the boundary of Dagupan and Calasiao.

DPWH was rushing to finish its old road widening project to make the roads a lot safer for motorists and pedestrians as well. Recall that road widening was started along the Manila North Road from Carmen, Rosales down to Sison.

Then DPWH shifted its project along the Dagupan to Lingayen road via Binmaley and from Urdaneta to Dagupan road via Sta. Barbara to Calasiao – all parts of the national highway.

In Sta. Barbara, the trees being cut today are  the trees that were given a lease on their life when the first tree-cutting was done by DPWH in compliance with a national program to create a wider carriage way for much bigger number of vehicles.

Know that the mango trees that used to line up along the highway in Sta. Barbara were planted  on the instance of the late Don Daniel Maramba, when he was the governor of Pangasinan. These trees were one of the biggest legacies of Don Daniel, a native of Sta. Barbara.

The highway from Urdaneta to Sta. Barbara and from Sta. Barbara to Calasiao and then to Dagupan used to be one of the finest provincial roads in Pangasinan because it used to be shaded by a canopy of arching branches of mango trees.

Motorists used to make stop-overs in Sta. Barbara along the highway to take a breather from their long journey under the shady huge mango trees. Now that these trees will all be gone in one fell swoop, no thanks to DPWH, there will be no more convenient place along the highways where motorists can make a brief layover and rest.

The mango trees are being systematically massacred today under the road widening program of the national government.

We can only nurture the happy days when these trees were still with us!

If the governor wants to construct the dreamed PWEx along the present east  to west roadway, thus there is no more need for land expropriation—they can just cut trees on both sides of the road.

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On the Pangasinan East-West Expressway proposed by our beloved governor Ramon Guico III as his pet  project, the people of the province are still in the dark as to where this highway will be constructed.  

How can anyone know when the Guv himself has not yet fully apprised the public on the location of this project.  This is a part from already planning to take an express train that will entail a borrowing of one billion peso loan to bankroll the same.

If it is a new road that will comprise the PEWEx, it means that private lands on which this highway will be built will have to be expropriated. And expropriation cannot be done easily and not in a matter of months or years. 

If the Guv did not take this into consideration, that proposed monumental project was clearly not studied well and is doomed to fail.

Methinks, that the P1 billion that the province intends to borrow from the Land Bank will not be enough for land expropriation alone, commencing from the east to west Pangasinan.  

Another project of the provincial government that is not well studied and questionable is the proposed Pangasinan Polytechnic College or University.

The Guv broached such project in a courtesy call two weeks ago made by officials, coaches and athletes who saw action in the Batang Pinoy in Ilocos Sur last year and was quoted as saying that an ordinance is needed to make the Pangasinan Polytechnic or University possible. But no ordinance has been passed in the Sangguniang Panlalawigan regarding this matter to this day.

However, the ever compliant SP already passed a resolution authorizing the governor to sign a loan to bankroll this school, among the P6 billion that the province proposes to borrow this year.

Wow!

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