DARIÉN GAP, Panama—The grind of heavy machinery breaks the silence of the Darién jungle, where the Pan-American Highway ends at Yaviza, Panama.
Construction workers have cleared towering trees to make way for a steel and concrete bridge mighty enough to withstand flooding from the Chucunaque River.
An onsite worker for the construction company Cusa told The Epoch Times that the construction project will cut four miles into the Darién jungle at a cost of $42 million and includes a second bridge crossing the Tuira River.
That would leave some 55 miles to finish the Pan-American Highway, also known as Highway 1, through the mountainous rainforest to connect it to Turbo, Colombia.
If it’s ever completed, the Pan-American Highway will stretch about 18,000 miles from Alaska to Argentina, opening up a land corridor the length of the Americas.
It has gone unfinished for decades because of American and Panamanian concerns over the environment, crime, and disease—and more recently, mass migration. The dangerous, rugged terrain acts as a natural barrier to travel from South to Central America.
The bridge and road expansion will end near the town of Bocas de Cupé in the Darién Gap. However, bridging the rivers has been considered one of the major obstacles blocking the completion of the highway.
The new project has worried some who fear that completing the road into the Darién Gap will be a win for China and a loss for the United States.