LEGAZPI CITY—President Aquino inaugurated the first Bicol four-lane bridge here four days before the May 9 elections.

The President was accompanied by Public Works Secretary Rogelio L. Singson, Albay Gov. Joey S. Salceda and City Mayor Noel E. Rosal.

Mr. Aquino proudly crossed on Thursday the P145-million, 135-meter-long Yawa Bridge. It spans the city’s Peñaranda route and Barangay Rawis that links the province’s Second and First Districts. Barangay Rawis is the site of the Bicol regional center.

In addition to the Yawa Bridge, the President also inaugurated the nearby P350-million Tibu River pumping station, which forms part of the P2-billion Legazpi flood-control project.

With the region’s 606 bridges scattered in six provinces including the island provinces of Masbate and Catanduanes, only a total of P1.3 billion have been earmarked this year for the widening of 33 bridges to four lanes. The bridges are within the Maharlika Highway route known as the primary national road, the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) records showed.

The Bicol Maharlika Highway stretches the Manila-Quezon-Bicol route passing through the Camarines Sur area toward Sorsogon, bypassing the Camarines Norte route.

With the road widened to four lanes, motorists complained about the hundreds of short two-lane bridges that they claimed pose a great danger to motorists and the public.

For years, the Yawa River (Legazpi-Daraga) route has been a center of controversy as the alleged source of corruption for billions of pesos worth of dredging works. The continued failure of private contractors and the government to finish dredging works prompted the Diocese of Legazpi to initiate opposition in 2005 against dredging contracts in Albay.

During Typhoon Reming in November 2007, close to 2,000 people died in Albay; 200 of them were residents living along the Yawa River. Then-Albay Gov. Fernando Gonzalez heaped the blame on the DPWH, with only 25 percent of construction actually finished.

Both DPWH Regional Director Reynaldo Tagudando and Albay Second District Engineering Office District Eng. Danilo Vela cannot be reached for comment.

Rosal said he fought for the widening of the two-lane Yawa Bridge to four lanes as early as 2013, because of the tremendous traffic in the area during rush hour. He said that, aside from the Yawa bridge expansion, the 500-meter-long bridge approach covering the front of the regional center has also been widened to five lanes.

The DPWH started its road-widening projects in 2004, yet has barely completed 25 percent of total projects, according to its report during the last quarter of 2015.