Travel woes of commuters

May I thank Rina Jimenez-David for her Sept. 10 and 27 columns on the Southwest Integrated Provincial Transport Terminal at Uniwide Coastal Mall. I regularly travel from Manila to Cavite and back, and I could feel her sympathy for the commuters adversely affected by the new setup. Surprisingly though, despite the cries of woes of these people, Cavite’s representatives and government leaders seem not to care.

The terminal is just a short distance (about 20 kilometers) from Cavite, which is a part of Mega Manila. Aside from the additional fare commuters have to shell out because of the new setup, using the terminal means loss of precious time because from there, there are no public utility vehicles to bring commuters direct to Manila. Passengers from Cavite, after alighting from the bus, have to walk and go up and down the pedestrian overpass, then walk again about 200 meters to the waiting area at Roxas Boulevard.

The setup is even more tedious for those going to Cavite because the buses have to be filled up with passengers before leaving, which takes about 10-15 minutes.

It also causes so much inconvenience to other Cavite/Metro Manila-bound motorists. While before it took just two traffic light cycles for a vehicle to pass through MIA Road, now it takes about four; and instead of the traffic being two-directional, now a big number of buses from Macapagal Boulevard are made to turn left to Roxas Boulevard.

What is ironic is, the combination of Metro Manila Development Authority’s Coastal Mall terminal and Erap’s “no buses in Manila” policy has not improved traffic at all. It gets even worse at times. What changed are the additional commuter fares, longer and more tedious travel, loss of precious time (for students and workers), and the far more inconvenient travel (for the people of Cavite).

Like in any situation there are losers and winners. First, the losers: (1) the bus companies using the terminal because of less passengers and less trips, (2) the students and workers who have to travel from Cavite to Metro Manila and back every day, (3) the real estate companies that are developing medium- to low-cost housing in Cavite whose sales will be affected by the longer and costlier travel, (4) traders buying goods for sale in Divisoria and (5) a lot of other sectors.

The winners are (1) MMDA’s Francis Tolentino (sabi ng mga taga-Cavite, galit siya sa kapwa niyang taga-Cavite) whose ego inflates every time he brags about the terminal, (2) Uniwide, (3) a lot of jeepneys which used to ply the Dasmariñas-Zapote route and now pass by Baclaran; commuters shunning Coastal Mall-bound buses take these jeepneys instead, and (4) one bus company plying the Dasmariñas-Navotas route, Jasper, whose units, though already very old, are always filled to the rafters because commuters would rather be inconvenienced inside the bus than transfer to another at Coastal Mall.

Many solutions  to the traffic problem in Metro Manila have been suggested and introduced. Why not just strictly implement traffic rules as is done in Subic? This will make drivers more disciplined, which will result in smoother traffic flow and safer road travel.

I hope David will continue writing about this issue for the sake of us, poor commuters.

 —JAY ESTRELLA, [email protected]