Anything under the Sun
Pre-war streets of Iloilo (2)
During the early American period, many more roads were built in Iloilo City. This is General Antonio Luna St. from the Provincial Capitol up to Molo following the Iloilo River Bank.
From Luna Street, many streets were built parallel to Iznart St. and crossing Ledesma Street. One of this is Valeria Street named after its donor Valeria Ledesma (daughter of Anastacio Ledesma). Others were Mabini Street, Quezon Street and San Agustin Street (now named after Nicholas Jalandoni – Speaker pro tempore of the First Philippine Assembly). From Luna Street another road (Infante Avenue) was built up to Baluarte meeting the road from Molo to Iloilo. Its site was donated by former capitan del pueblo de Iloilo, Salvador Infante.
All these parallel streets (except Infante Avenue) end at Rizal Street – another new street built from one corner of the Plaza following the coastline up to Tanza ending at Bonifacio Monument and crossing Iznart Streets at Maria Clara Monument. Parallel to this was another street Juan de Leon Street (from a municipal president of Iloilo) was built from Iznart Street to Bonifacio Monument.
From Iznart Street about midway from the provincial capitol and Plazoleta Gay and parallel Ledesma Street and Gen. Luna Street was constructed General Martin Delgado Street (the longest in Iloilo) ending at Infante Avenue.
From Delgado Street, Amparo Street (now Fuentes Street), was constructed on the site donated by Amaparo Ledesma, another daughter of Anastacio Ledesma.
In the area near Fort San Pedro were the Zamora, Gomez and Burgos Streets named after the three martyr-priests, Severino Duran Street after a revolucionario and Blumentrit – friend of Rizal.
From Muelle Loney three more streets were added – Arroyo after Sen. Jose Maria Arroyo, Solis – another revolucionario, Aldeguer who donated the road lot, Mapa presumably after Chief Justice Victorino Mapa and Esperidion Guanco, a senator.
These are the streets in Iloilo City before the war most of which were constructed during the American time. It seems that practically, they are the same streets as today with changes merely in names.