A completed section of Tacloban Bypass Road. (Photo courtesy of the Department of Public Works and Highways)

TACLOBAN CITY -- Road expansion will cause 12-hour power interruption in this city and two nearby towns on Saturday, the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) said on Thursday.

The power outage, scheduled from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., will disrupt the activities of 66,744 business establishments and households in this city, and towns of Palo and Babatngon, Leyte.

“This is due to the relocation of structures affected by the construction of a four-lane by-pass road by the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH),” the NGCP said in a statement.

The four-lane Tacloban bypass road designed to decongest the city’s major thoroughfare will be completely passable next year, according to DPWH.

The NGCP earlier scheduled the interruption on July 21. However, it was postponed due to the conduct of site re-survey of the new six-lane road.

The PHP924.55-million project, which has been implemented in five phases since 2015, is up for completion in August 2019.

Three phases of the four-lane road opening and concreting project have been completed since last year. Still ongoing are phase 4 (85.54 percent) and phase 5 (4.90 percent).

The 6.4-kilometer bypass road, which starts at Tigbao village and ends at Caibaan village, was constructed to decongest traffic along the Maharlika Highway, said DPWH. (PNA)