Puente de España
| Puente de España | |
|---|---|
The Puente de España in 1899
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| Coordinates | 14°35′46″N 120°58′40.4″E / 14.59611°N 120.977889°ECoordinates: 14°35′46″N 120°58′40.4″E / 14.59611°N 120.977889°E |
| Carries | Vehicular and pedestrian traffic (1630-1914) Streetcar (1905-1914) |
| Crosses | Pasig River |
| Locale | Manila, Philippines |
| Other name(s) | Puente Grande or Puente de piedra (1630-1863) |
| Preceded by | Puente Colgante (1852), now Quezon Bridge Santa Cruz Bridge (1902) |
| Followed by | None |
| Characteristics | |
| Material | Volcanic tuff |
| Total length | 414.25 ft (126.26 m) |
| Width | 22.25 ft (6.78 m) (1814-1901) widened in 1901 |
| No. of spans | Puente Grande, 10 Puente de España, 8 |
| History | |
| Architect | Lucas de Jesus María (1630) |
| Engineering design by | Antonio Herrera (1630) |
| Constructed by | Spanish colonial government in the Philippines |
| Construction start | 1626 |
| Construction end | 1630 |
| Opened | 1630 |
| Collapsed | 1914 |
| Closed | 1921 |
Puente de España or the Bridge of Spain was a bridge that spanned the Pasig River in the Philippines connecting the areas of Binondo and Santa Cruz on Calle Nueva (now E.T. Yuchengco St) with the central Manila. The span was the oldest established in the country before it was damaged by flood in 1914. The bridge was replaced by Jones Bridge that was started 1916 and completed in 1921, located one block downriver from Puente de España on Calle Rosario (now Quintin Paredes St).
The first bridge to ever cross the Pasig River was the Puente Grande, a ten-span bridge opened in 1630 by the Spanish colonial government. Work on the bridge started in 1626 under the rule of Spanish Governor Fernando de Silva who reported that the city had decided to build a stone bridge over the river. The beam bridge connected Intramuros and with the business district of Binondo, making the travel across easier and faster than the ferry service that existed before. The bridge was completed in 1630, under the rule of Juan Niño de Tabora. The bridge was built without cost to the treasury, as the Sangleys (Chinese) had paid for it as it relieved them of ferryboat charges.
The work of construction was directed by the Recollect priest Lucas de Jesus María, and that the bridge as built consisted of stone piers and a wooden superstructure. At the south end of the bridge is a structure called Fortín y Mira (small fort and look-out). Its use was to guard this approach to the city as part of the defence of Manila. The wooden superstructure, besides being more easily and cheaply built, had a military value in that communications between the two parts of the city, as divided by the river, could be easily and quickly destroyed by destroying the woodwork. This was done during an insurrection of the Chinese in 1638.
The engineering work was credited to an Augustinian friar Antonio Herrera. In order to expose the river bed, he diverted half of the water of the river into the moats and esteros (canals) which existed along the east and south fronts of the walled city and then cut a channel from the west end of the moat, on the south (near Paseo de Luneta) to the sea. By building heavy dikes he removed the water from a part of the river bed, which permitted the construction of the piers for half of the bridge. The same plan was followed for the piers of the other half. The piers were built of a local stone, known locally as Guadalupe adobe stone named from where the stones were quarried (now Brgy. Guadalupe Viejo in Makati City); its formation being a volcanic tuff.
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Wikipedia