Photo of Rancho River Bridge in Lipa [1930, BPW Annual Report] - Batangas History, Culture and Folklore Photo of Rancho River Bridge in Lipa [1930, BPW Annual Report] - Batangas History, Culture and Folklore

Photo of Rancho River Bridge in Lipa [1930, BPW Annual Report]

Batangas History
25 Dec, 2017

This photograph is part of a series showing mostly construction projects undertaken by the Bureau of Public Works during the American colonial era. All photographs have been digitally extracted from the Quarterly Bulletins1 of the bureau and processed using graphics editing software to improve quality. It goes without saying that the eventual output of each extract was always going to be dependent on the quality of the original scan.

The Rancho River Bridge, a picture of which taken in 1930 is shown below, is a short span on the outskirts of the-now city of Lipa near the border of the Municipality of Cuenca. It is presently a modern four-lane bridge made of concrete, but in 1929, when it was opened, it just offered two lanes commensurate with road traffic at the time with steel trusses above it.

The 1930 Annual Report of the Director of the Bureau of Public Works had this brief description about this bridge:

Rancho River Bridge, Batangas Province — This spans the Rancho River at Km. 139 of the Cuenca-Banaybanay-Lipa Road. It was financed from a loan fund from the Postal Savings Bank. The project was advertised for bids in the early part of the year and the successful bidder, Mr. Marion E. Martin of Manila, carried out construction work in a creditable manner. The bridge is a 100-foot steel truss span and was opened to traffic on October 20, 19291.
Rancho River Bridge Lipa Batangas 1930
The Rancho River Bridge in Lipa, 1930. Image digitally extracted from the 1930 Annual Report of the Bureau of Public Works.
Notes and references:
1 “Bureau of Public Works Annual Report, Volume 18 No. 1,” published July 1930 in Manila by the Bureau of Public Works.
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