There seems to be an endless amount of construction everywhere in Panama. A bigger project that started recently in David is the new bus terminal. It looks like it will also include a major shopping center, so it will be interesting to watch this develop.

I biked up Via Boquete yesterday and the construction site is on that road, on the north edge of David.

Coming back down from Boquete and parts north, you start to see a lot of ground being cleared.

I wonder what they are going to do with this huge rock.

At the other end of the cleared area you start to see the machinery.

At this point it’s only a lot of ground work, but there is a lot of heavy machinery on site.

There was also quite a bit of extra traffic on Via Boquete, mainly heavy dump trucks. There was a security guard at the entrance to the construction site, a policeman at the entrance to Santa Cruz, and flag men on the northbound side of the highway at a side street north of the site, and also at another intersection south of the site. Judging by the mud tracks on the road there have been many trucks traveling to and from the construction site.

Below is a promotional video that shows what is planned for this site. It looks like it is going to be quite something when it is finished!

I have heard mixed reactions to the new terminal. It’s going to be nice up here where there is more space for buses to get in and out, more parking space for cars, and it looks like it is also going to be a major shopping center. Others like the terminal downtown where it is close to everything, and people who bus in can get to whatever they need on foot. It was also said that there is a clinic close to the downtown terminal, but the clinic proposed near the new terminal will be private and unaffordable for many who take buses. I’m glad they have built a nice new Via Boquete, and they are working on access to and from the Pan-American Highway because there is definitely going to be a big increase in traffic.

I still amazes me to see all the construction going on. There is a huge expansion project underway on the Pan-American highway between David and Santiago. In David south of town there is a big new Romero’s, a large Cochez that is going up rapidly, and a number of other commercial spaces. Just a bit south is the beginnings of a new sports center. There is a commercial center under construction just south of us, one of many I have seen around town. There is also a lot of new housing being built, much of it is entirely new neighborhoods. It seems like anywhere you go, you will run into some construction project within a few blocks. That’s a lot of material, machines, and man power!

It will be interesting to watch the new terminal develop. It will give me more motivation to bike up the mountain and work on my climbing muscles!