One lane of the Ibarra – San Lorenzo road, at the height of El Guadual, Km 114, was enabled. In that sector there were two landslides that obstructed the passage and took the table from the road, on December 21 and 22, respectively.
The landslides left approximately 40,000 people incommunicado from the La Carolina, Lita, and Buenos Aires parishes in Imbabura; Jijón and Caamaño and El Goaltal in Carchi; and Alto Tambo, in Esmeraldas.
Carlos Viteri, president of the Decentralized Autonomous Parish Government of La Carolina, said that they must have used explosive charges to demolish the rocky area that prevented vehicular traffic, material that was financed by the community.
The pass was opened on Thursday afternoon after part of the rock was broken and cracked to build a roadway lane.
Arturo Fuentes, the new governor of Imbabura, arrived at the place, where he warned that the open section is high risk.
However, the desperate residents in the face of the blockade that lasted 23 days decided not to heed the warning and use part of the new layout of the reconstructed highway on which only light vehicles can circulate on a single platform.
Bus drivers with passengers from the Espejo cooperative that cover the San Lorenzo – Ibarra route overcome from the compromised section, amid the tension of the travelers due to the narrowness of the artery.
One of the advantages for now is that the rains have decreased in intensity, something that prevents more earth movements or the cars from slipping. “We risked using pulleys and walking around the rock, because we are not going to advance this stretch,” say the residents of Lita.
Fernando Rea, director of the MTOP in Imbabura, explained that the machinery cleaned the place and widened the road table, gaining a little space and reaching a firm table to provisionally give way to emerging vehicles.
The technician confirmed that definitive studies are essential, since there is a risk, because the road is on a slope and there are loose stones in the upper part, so it is necessary to intervene the site with more machinery.
This Saturday, MTOP workers will manually lower the stones onto the slope in a controlled manner to minimize risk. “There has not been any advantageous inconvenience, but it is necessary to continue with the work,” Rea said.
He clarified that the parish councils decided to meet and collect funds that would have been used in the acquisition of the explosives; however, specialists recommend not to continue carrying out more blasting
Since last Tuesday they began to blow up the place. Edwin Querembás, an engineering professional, was the one who directed and provided the materials to clear the rock where part of the highway was built.
The losses are unquantifiable, said Armando Cadena, president of the Jijón and Caamaño parish, who added that the production did not come out in its entirety, since through the alternate routes of Buenos Aires (Imbabura) or Chical (Carchi) they used between 10 and 12 hours and had to pay freight that exceeded $120.
According to the residents, about 800 vehicles circulate daily on this road, at the moment the flow is not as expected, since the users of the road that connects the Pacific Coast with the Northern Sierra are still unaware that a lane is enabled, Cadena said. (I)
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