Puente de España

The work of construction was directed by the Recollect priest Lucas de Jesus María, and that the bridge as built consisted of stone piers and a wooden superstructure. At the south end of the bridge is a structure called Fortín y Mira (small fort and look-out). Its use was to guard this approach to the city as part of the defence of Manila. The wooden superstructure, besides being more easily and cheaply built, had a military value in that communications between the two parts of the city, as divided by the river, could be easily and quickly destroyed by destroying the woodwork. This was done during an insurrection of the Chinese in 1638.[1]

The engineering work was credited to an Augustinian friar Antonio Herrera. In order to expose the river bed, he diverted half of the water of the river into the moats and esteros (canals) which existed along the east and south fronts of the walled city and then cut a channel from the west end of the moat, on the south (near Paseo de Luneta) to the sea. By building heavy dikes he removed the water from a part of the river bed, which permitted the construction of the piers for half of the bridge. The same plan was followed for the piers of the other half. The piers were built of a local stone, known locally as Guadalupe adobe stone named from where the stones were quarried (now Brgy. Guadalupe Viejo in Makati City); its formation being a volcanic tuff.[1]

The Puente Grande, also called the Puente de Piedra (Stone bridge) after the wooden superstructure was replaced with stone arches in 1814.

The Puente de España during the American Colonial Period after it was widened and tracks were added for streetcars.

In September, 1914, non-stop rains flooded the streets of Manila and swelling the Pasig River. The flood damaged the central pier of the bridge and was removed. A temporary truss bridge was installed after a few months over the remaining spans while a replacement bridge was constructed one block downriver.

In 1916, the construction was started on a neoclassical reinforced concrete arch bridge by the American colonial government across Calle Rosario on the site of the old temporary Puente de Barcas. The span was renamed as Jones Bridge after former Virginia Rep. William Atkinson Jones, who was the principal author of the Philippine Autonomy Act of 1916,[4] a bill assuring the future independence of the Philippines. The bridge was completed and opened for traffic in 1921.[5] Soon after, the Bridge of Spain was dismantled ending its long history. Its replacement, Jones Bridge, was destroyed by bombs during the Battle of Manila in World War II and was replaced by the present bridge (Jones Bridge II).[6][7]