BBM’s flood promise meets 8-foot reality
‘During the rainy season, houses are no longer flooded. Families who have been affected for a long time no longer need to worry.’
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‘During the rainy season, houses are no longer flooded. Families who have been affected for a long time no longer need to worry.’
Residents of Barangay Tatalon in Quezon City evacuated through chest-deep floodwater on Monday as water levels surged upward of eight feet, flooding a community where President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. had declared less than two months earlier
that families should no longer have to worry about their homes being flooded.
A video posted by the official Barangay Tatalon page at 1:17 p.m. Monday showed residents wading through chest-high water as the barangay’s flood gauge stood at five feet. By 2:05 p.m., the gauge was approaching eight feet.
Portions of Tatalon and nearby sections of G. Araneta Avenue and E. Rodriguez Sr. Avenue were inundated as the San Juan River overflowed amid the intense southwest monsoon rains.
The flooding came after Marcos inspected the completed portion of the P482.5-million G. Araneta Drainage Improvement Project on 26 June and touted its early results.
“During the rainy season, houses are no longer flooded. Families who have been affected for a long time no longer need to worry,” Marcos had said in a post about the project.
The government said the enlarged drainage system was allowing water to move more quickly and the residents were already noticing the difference. Marcos said the project would continue on the other side of the road to further improve the drainage system.
Monday’s flooding did not, by itself, establish that the drainage project had failed. The project was designed to increase the drainage capacity and shorten the time floodwater remained in the area, while its effectiveness would also depend on the capacity of the San Juan River, the pumping facilities, other drainage lines, and the regular clearing of debris.
But the event has exposed a critical limitation in the system — the water still has to go somewhere once it reaches the river.
What Marcos promised
The Araneta project was presented as a major intervention in one of Quezon City’s most flood-prone areas.
The project covered 758 meters from Kaliraya Street to E. Rodriguez Sr. Avenue and involved the installation of two 1.5-meter high-density polyethylene pipes to supplement the existing drainage system. It is part of the government’s Oplan Kontra Baha program.
Government project documents put the expected drainage time at about 3.71 hours, compared with roughly 19.8 hours under the old system.
During his June inspection, Marcos said residents had told him that the flooding previously reached the second floor of houses even after relatively little rain, while now the accumulated water disappeared more quickly.
“It seems to be effective,” Marcos said at the time.
He also said the drainage system was only halfway through its planned improvement and that the other side of the road would be upgraded to allow water to flow out more quickly.
But the President also identified garbage as a potential threat to the system, saying that floodwaters carry debris into the drainage network and can cause blockages.
He called for a regular system of garbage collection and declogging by Quezon City.
Catch basin
That issue was visible again during Monday’s flooding, when Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon pointed to the volume of garbage in the San Juan River.
Barangay Administrator Raymond Butiun Jr. described the 96-hectare community as a “catch basin” for District 4 because water from higher-lying neighboring barangays flows into Tatalon during heavy rain.
“During typhoons, most of the water from their areas flows down to us,” Butiun said in Filipino.
He said residents expect flooding even without a typhoon when the rainfall is intense.
Tatalon has 63,129 residents and 11,800 households, according to barangay records.
An evacuation update from the Quezon City government as of 10 a.m. Tuesday showed 308 families, or 1,045 individuals, staying in four evacuation centers: Victory Covered Court, Dr. Josefa Jara Martinez High School, Peoples Park and Light House Baptist Church.
River reached its limit
Dizon inspected the San Juan River on Tuesday after it overflowed during Monday’s rains and said additional capacity was still needed to contain the excess water.
“We still lack a catch basin,” he said in Filipino.
Dizon said the Department of Public Works and Highways was planning to build a detention basin upstream to temporarily store excess water before it reaches the San Juan River.
The agency has identified a possible site and will coordinate with the Quezon City government, although Dizon said the area has a large informal settler population.
Dizon said the DPWH would also continue to dredge the San Juan River and operate pumps to bring down water levels. He said the floodwater receded after about six hours, with the river level falling by around 8 p.m. after pumping operations.
Drainage only one part of system
The G. Araneta drainage system discharges toward the San Juan River, making the condition and capacity of the waterway central to the project’s performance during heavy rain.
The government has been carrying out dredging and other rehabilitation works along the river. Quezon City has also partnered with San Miguel Corp. to dredge, desilt, and clear the waterway.
Monday’s flooding provided an opportunity for DPWH to measure whether the upgraded drainage had delivered the improvement promised by the government.
The key figures are the depth and duration of the flooding compared with previous events, the amount of water carried by the new pipes, the time required for the area to drain and the role played by pumps and the San Juan River’s water level.
A six-hour recession, if confirmed by DPWH data, would indicate an improvement over the nearly 20-hour drainage time cited in project documents.
But that would not change the fact that Tatalon flooded severely enough on Monday to require evacuations.
