[ manilastandardtoday.com ] November 5, 2009
Urban planner Felino Palafox Jr. will not allow Laguna Lake to claim Bay Breeze Executive Village in Taguig City, urging residents instead to live with nature instead of fighting it.
The 87-hectare property has remained submerged waist-deep since rains due to storm Ondoy when lake authorities monitored the water level at 13.82 meters against the average 11.8 meters to 12.6 meters from July to September.
“Dwellers must restructure their houses higher than the normal water elevation,” he told Standard Today, adding that the subdivision had to go vertical.
“They should be built higher than the 100-year flood history [from] 1909 and 1972 reportedly higher than the 2009 floods. Structures there must be built on stilts, just like the Badjaos or the boathouses in Seattle,” he said, referring to the traditional village of native Mindanao seafarers and an American marina-style enclave.
The C-6 road dike, a main component of the anti-flood system to keep Metro Manila from sinking during the wet season, was built, unfortunately leaving out the subdivision to surges in the lake.
Taguig Mayor Freddie Tinga said he had lobbied to have the structure realigned only to find the section in his locality fasttracked, the stretch extending to the Napindan bridge at the boundary of Pasig City in Nagpayong, Pinagbuhatan.
In his lineup of projects, Palafox said he has work commissioned in Dubai and in Roxas City applying water-adapted designs.
“No single-detached houses, but medium-rise buildings... with elevated walkways and dikes. People live upstairs, and not downstairs,” he said, describing elements of his ongoing projects.
Palafox would not discount berths for motor boats to cruise water lanes.
But he said Bay Breeze residents may yet set foot on dry ground again and drive through its streets.
According to Palafox, a road dike higher than the lake’s 12.5 meters water elevation must be built along with the stalled spillway in Parañaque to release excess water to Manila Bay.
The natural drainage is the Pasig River snaking downtown with many curves that slowdown flow on top of siltation which further lessens the waterways carrying capacity.
Palafox said he was in Singapore when Press Secretary Cerge Remonde and Secretary to the Cabinet Silvestre Bello III set up a meeting with President Arroyo on reviving the counterpart of the Manggahan floodway.
“Under the 1977 World Bank-funded study entitled the Metro Manila Transport, Land Use and Development Planning Project, vertical urbanism, construction of dikes and spillways were recommended in flood-prone areas, such as those within Laguna Lake, to no avail,” he noted.
“One of the most important solutions to Bay Breeze is the implementation of the Parañaque spillway. Bay Breeze should have not been inundated if only the spillway was built,” he said.
Palafox said the Manggahan weir should have been complementary to the Parañaque floodway but the Metro Manila Commission, now the Metro Manila Development Authority, put it in the back burner “for still no apparent reason.” Leo A. Estonilo and Rio N. Araja
_____________________________________________________________________________________
