travel

Yes, you can get from the west to the east side of the Panama Canal, or vice-versa, by air or sea.

Moreover, if you have a good four-wheeler or perhaps a dirt bike, during the dry season you can turn off the Pan-American Highway near La Chorrera, drive out past La Arenosa and take a crude dirt track around Gatun Lake to Cuipo and Escobal, then drive across the Gatun Dam and get across the canal by the swing bridge at the locks. In November, however, the rains make the way between La Arenosa and Cuipo pretty much impassable even for the best off road vehicles.

(In ARI's once-celebrated land use plan, a second bridge or a tunnel was supposed to cross the canal on the Atlantic side, eliminating the traffic bottlenecks caused when ships going through the locks keep the swing bridge out of use. Beyond that, there was once talk of another bridge across the lower Chagres River and a road connecting Colon with the Interior, possibly by way of El Valle or Penonome. Such developments would certainly boost the economy and ease the way of life for the out-of-the-way Costa Abajo. But hey --- that's Colon province, and who cares about Colon? Certainly not the people who have been deciding the government's capital improvement policies for the past several years.)

Ah, but there's a second Pacific side bridge now. Mireya inaugurated it just before she left office.

That, however, is not yet open, and we don't know when it will be. Its entrances are not done. On the west side of the canal, the old road that served the US Army's Empire Range is now under the control of the Panama Canal Authority and strictly closed to the public. The second bridge project is so incomplete that the lighting needed to prevent ships from crashing into the structure is powered by a diesel generator, as the connection to the national power grid has yet to be made. Also, the nation is awaiting reports from the Panamanian Society of Architects and Engineers (SPIA) and the Ministry of Public Works (MOP) about the gravity of certain structural faults with the new bridge, which have to do with variances of a few inches from the plans and questions about how solid the foundations are or are not.

(Of course, as you PanCanal old timers may also point out, there is also the swing bridge at Miraflores. That connects to the same closed military road that passes by the west end of the new bridge, and in any case has been out of service for many years. In the event of a fairly severe emergency, however, it could probably be pressed back into service.)

The bottom line? If you want to travel by road between Panama City and the Interior, the Bridge of the Americas is still your only practical option. That makes things a bit easier if you're a directing a police search for someone moving around the country in a car, but it can be quite the pain if you want to get from Tocumen Airport to Santa Clara and something or someone is tying up traffic between the bridge and downtown Arraijan.

This, however, is Panama. Set aside your industrialized country concepts of time and relax. If traffic is jammed on or around the Bridge of the Americas, just relax and wait. Things will eventually get moving again.

Back to top