Simpler solutions to traffic woes

Atty. Jerome G. Neri
The Scrutineer

IN the last Presidential debate, the candidates were asked as to what their solution to the traffic problem in Metro Manila would be? I was not happy with any of the answers. To me they were all big talk that would not even give the desired results. Among the the five of them Vice President Binay gave the best answer. He said education, enforcement and engineering. He was the only one who saw the need to educate the driving public.

I bet that less than one percent of the drivers in the country today has read our highway code and the Vienna convention on road signs, two important laws that must be known and understood by every driver’s license holder. This is the basis and foundation for the driving public to know how to discipline themselves on the road. Therefore, it is important to include motoring as a subject in the school curriculum. In the long run we will have better drivers. The corruption at the LTO likewise needs to be ended so that licenses cannot be bought, only earned.

The other candidates talked of grand plans, Duterte talked of a modern railway system, while Roxas bragged about improving the current MRT and LRT. Senator Grace Poe talked about putting up a subway system. Senator Miriam was the other one who had a good solution, which was to move the Government Offices and Schools to a less populated place in the province, thereby decongesting Metro Manila.

I think there are simpler solutions. In highly populated areas, there should be absolutely no stopping, as a vehicle that stops on the road effectively creates a bottleneck. The tiniest of bottlenecks in a populated area will bring about congestion behind it within a few minutes.

Thus, having bus stops or jeepney stops should not be allowed on any major thoroughfare and in congested streets. Mass public transportation should be point to point on these streets. The sidewalks on these streets should be repaired and covered to encourage pedestrian traffic. The same should be for all National Highways whether or not it is in a populated area.

Thus, the first step in solving any traffic problem is to get organized. The better organized our transportation system is, the less traffic.

No matter how organized we can get in the flow of the traffic, as long as Metro Manila and, in the foreseeable future, Metro Cebu continues to grow, attracting more and more people beyond the number than what these metropolises can handle, there will be congestion and travel time will be slow. The answer to this is good urban planning. City officials must know the capacity of its city and should not overload it. This means that any major private development must be complemented by public infrastructure development to handle the volume of traffic to be brought about by private development. A good example of what not to do is SM Seaside City in SRP.

The SRP has a major road that connects Cebu City. As it is right now, the main road of SRP is the access road to SM. A service road should have been made whereby motorists going to the mall will exit to keeping the main road open through and through. Moreover, that corner going to Seaside should not be there, as it is a choke point. A flyover is in order.

It is only after we can get our streets organized, our drivers educated enough, and having some common-sense urban planning to make what we have now more efficient that we will be ready for a modern mass transit system.

All these political talk of having a railway here and there, a mass transit system in the urban areas, etc. will not work without the aforementioned conditions.