Ibarra
The intervention of the Ibarra-San Lorenzo highway, at the height of El Guadual, is one of the urgent demands of the authorities of the provinces of Imbabura, Esmeraldas and Carchi.
The landslides do not stop in this sector as a result of the rains, a situation that forces the road to be closed constantly due to the frequent fall of stones, earth and mud that erase the route of the road at km 114, on the E 10, affecting 40,000 inhabitants of five parishes who feel the ravages of this failure.
A single lane is functional until this critical junction has the studies and works that would definitively enable this road that joins the northern Sierra with the Coast and the Pacific.
The technicians point out that the weather conditions and the instability of the slope do not allow the road to be stabilized, nor to normalize the traffic of motor vehicles. The large volumes of stone material that come down from the mountain have startled and eaten the table of the state road.
The work carried out by motorists with heavy machines from the Ministry of Transportation and Public Works (MTOP), the La Corolina Parish Board and the Municipality of Ibarra are not yet complete.
The land continues to descend towards the precipice, plugging the only inhabited lane. MTOP technicians explain that it is difficult to build a variant due to the irregular topography of the place.
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The narrowness of the space that adjoins a rocky area encourages the use of explosives to widen this artery, which for now only allows the passage of small cars and buses, but during the day.
Transfers and risks
The drivers of the passenger transport units that operate in this sector have chosen to make transfers when there are suspensions to mitigate the danger to users.
Travelers or residents of the sector who seek to move to San Lorenzo, Carchi or Imbabura when there are obstacles must avoid them by running and looking towards the upper part of the mountain range, seeing that no rocks or earth fall.
The people who are on the sides, on the other hand, warn them with shouts about probable fatalities, registering since last December 21, 2021, the date on which the largest landslide occurred, the death of a person who did not manage to overcome mounds of earth and two traffic accidents.
Given the failures in the sectors of San Pedro and Peña Negra, buses and trucks circulate along the route that joins Guallupe-San Juan de Lachas-Chinambí and Rocafuerte, which takes an additional hour of travel on a secondary road.
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Marcelo Cabrera, Minister of Transport and Public Works, held a working meeting with representatives of the prefectures of the three provinces, in which he reported on the intervention of this section.
The Secretary of State insisted that they have analyzed various alternatives to solve this problem, based on surface geophysics studies. For Cabrera, it is urgent to promote the emergency declaration to facilitate the flow of economic resources and carry out the work immediately.
The construction of a metal bridge over 80 meters in length, with dynamic barriers to contain the material from the slope, at the site of the landslide, which includes kilometer 114, in the El Guadual community, is the option that is gaining the most strength. .
Until a definitive solution is achieved, the routes: San Gerónimo-Buenos Aires-Cahuasquí-Ibarra, and Guallupe-Gualchán-Chical-Tulcán are enabled as emerging and safe to remove production from the area.
Pablo Jurado, prefect of Imbabura, maintains that it is important to urgently solve this serious inconvenience that prevents mobility; while Armando Cadena, president of the Jijón and Caamaño Parish Council (Carchi), indicates that the national authority is fulfilling the commitments made on January 18 when it arrived at the place.
Rubén Rosero, from the San Lorenzo On Line information page, reported that the road was closed early this Sunday, but with picks and shovels the inhabitants of La Carolina re-opened a lane for the passage of small cars and buses.
Between Lita and El Guadual there are regularly five road closures due to the loosening of the slopes, the communicator indicated, and the roadway is currently partially enabled. (I)
Source: Eluniverso
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