Some Solutions to Metro Manila's Traffic Madness

* image from web.mit.edu

We've all been the victims of Metro Manila's 5 km/hour crawl rate.  The newspapers talk about the Japanese study that says the problem costs us US$52 million each day.  How to unravel the mess?  Here are some of my ideas:

Short Term

1.  No parking along all streets of Metro Manila, except for those streets considered as private land.

2.  Traffic on national roads should always be moving, no stops allowed on the national road.  Loading and unloading will be allowed only in city and municipality roads or on private land adjacent to national roads (e.g. Mega Mall bus terminal).  Of course, let's do away with the de-facto terminals on public roads.

3.  That having been said, it follows that private bus & jeepney terminals should be encouraged.  I go even further to say that terminal operators will be free from income taxes. The higher the capacity of the terminal (daily passenger volume per square meter of land), the longer the income tax holiday. This means that bus and jeepney operators can bind together via associations or federations to purchase lots and build multi-level terminals that will serve as loading and unloading points along city roads.  DBP and LBP can be mandated to extend credit facilities to these institutions.

3.  Car parks will also be free from income taxes.  The higher the density (car slots per square meter of land), the longer the income tax holiday.  This will encourage people to construct car parks (which can either be rented out or sold like condominium units).

4.  Public roads that have been gated by Barangay officials (probably for security reasons) must be open for at least 16 hours a day.

5.  Vehicles older than 30 years old will not be allowed to operate in Metro Manila.  You can drive them elsewhere, but not in Metro Manila.

6.  Encourage car pooling and ride sharing via media ads.

7.  Counter flow will be allowed only when traffic cones delineate the counter flow zone.

8.  Dedicate more lanes for public utility vehicles.  Specially in key strategic choke points, public transportation takes priority over private vehicles.

9.  Rationalize bus/jeepney routes & franchises.  For example, too many buses ply the EDSA route, and sometimes there are many buses with no riders.

10.  Arm the traffic enforcers with radios, mobile communication, CCTV cameras, motorcycles and LED info screens.  Use the social media, computer applications (e.g. Waze) and GPS systems for traffic awareness among the general public.  Install CCTVs along major thoroughfares and allow the public to access the visual displays of certain CCTV cameras.

11.  Force the LTFRB and the LTO to do their jobs well.  Enforce non-moving violations to weed out the undesirable drivers and operators.

12.  Build many more waiting sheds around the city.  Better wind & rain protection.  Lighted. Heavy duty hand railings to control queues and waiting lines.  Ad spaces can be sold to generate local government income.  Taxi sheds, jeepney sheds, bus sheds.

Medium Term

1.  This is Kong Kong's favorite--Build more bridges along the Pasig River.  Maybe 10 new bridges are needed.  To cross from north to south means having to go through one of the existing bridges, and as it is right now, all these bridges have become choke points.

2.  Divert port operations to Batangas and Subic.  Encourage these 2 ports to rise up to the occasion.

3. Connect the North Diversion Road with the South Super Highway (already under construction c/o SMC, set to open in 2017).

4.  Rationalize car ownership laws--it will be mandatory to attach a permanent parking space designated to a specific car.  If you don't have a parking space for the car, you can't own it.  If the vehicle is resold, then the new owner must declare the permanent parking space for the car.  They do this in Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong.

5.  Complete the radial roads.  These have been discussed since the 1950s and nothing has been done.

6.  Allow LGUs to build better pedestrian sidewalks, underpass & overpass systems.

7.   Feed more airline activity into Clark, lessen the dependence on NAIA.

8.  Mission Impossible--solve flooding in the metropolis.

9.  Be strict with planning laws and building regulations.  If the prescribed ratio of car park in a mall is say 1 car slot per 100 square meters of floor area, follow this to the letter.

Long Term

1.  Build more mass transit lines.  Overhead, underground.  Suburban stops must have large car parking spaces (as in capable of housing 8,000 vehicles).  People drive to the train stops, park their cars there, and take the train into and out of the city.

2.  Build 2 more circumferential roads.  C6 and C7 need to be 22-lane and 32-lane monsters respectively.

3. Encourage emigration.  Metro Manila is just too crowded.  Neighboring cities and provinces must take up the challenge to attract new jobs and house the growing population. There are a lot of good places to live in places like Lipa (Batangas), Angeles (Pampanga), Tarlac (Tarlac).

4.  Reclaim land in front of Navotas & Malabon, build a super highway (20 lanes) on top.  The reclamation will ease the flooding in these cities, and the highway will also connect to the existing road network from the south that ends at the pier.

5.  Bring more business, trade, commerce, education facilities and government offices to major city centers in the Visayas and Mindanao.  Imperialist Manila is no more!

6.   Build an airport city south of Manila.

Caveats

The template assumes that certain things are sacred and cannot be touched.  It will be political suicide.  Could be a riot in the making too.  For example--

1.  You can't phase out the jeepneys.  It won't happen, believe me.

2.  Enforcers are human.  They think they are better than the computer system and will override the traffic light.

3.  Bystanders are also human and will always mill around any accident.  It will take time for the ambulance, the police and the tow-truck to untangle the Gordian knot.

4.  Tinderos and tinderas will always turn part of the road into an extension of the palengke.  Basketball players will cordon off the road during summer time.

5.  There will always be offensive drivers even if you keep your cool and remain a defensive driver.

6.  Street children and the kalesa are the kings of the road.  Period.  End of story.

7.  You will not be able to regulate motorcycle drivers by giving them a motorcycle lane.  They will zig zag their way to get ahead of you.

8.  Riders will rush onto the street to get first crack at boarding the bus or jeep.  Some even dangle at the doorway, with one foot on the ledge and one hand at the handrail.  I know, I've done this already.

9.  Riders will get down anywhere, even in the middle of the street.  Even if the bus or jeep is still running.

10.  Potholes always crop up.  We have a rainy season and the asphalt on the overlay is pretty sub-standard.

11.  Road signs are confusing, some even downright wrong.

12.  You cannot tinker with the operating hours of schools and offices.  It is practically impossible to change the human body clock.  No one wants their kids to go to wake up at 4am to start school at 6am.  No working mom wants to come home at midnight.

13.  You can't mandate who rides in someone's car.  You can't force people to accept strangers into their vehicles.

14.  Traditional politicians have no political will.  Other free-thinkers have to make things move.

15.  You can't put a cap on population growth.  If you look at the situation closely, manpower is our prime export.  We therefore have to capitalize on our core competence--nurture our young by building more schools and facilities to enable our graduates to go out and conquer the world.  We have realized there is no such thing as brain-drain.  All overseas Pinoys will come back at some point, and the country will be richer for it.

So, consider this--if the traffic slows down due to some of the above reasons, then there are very little things that you can do about the specific situation.  In fact, some of the solutions that we think of could actually even backfire.  Look at the number coding scheme--it worked for a while, but people started to buy a second car to go around the rules!

Even if you are super inconvenienced, you sometimes have to temporarily grin and bear it!  Maybe a complete overhaul of the "damaged Pinoy psyche" could be made?

What do you think?