How to improve transportation in Metro Manila

Now that former Sen. Mar Roxas is the new secretary of transportation and communications, perhaps there will be more order and rationality in the conduct of transportation in the country, with emphasis on Metro Manila where traffic congestion is at its worst. The population of the metropolis is exploding, so naturally more people need more transportation to move around. Unfortunately, Metro Manila does not have enough roads to accommodate all the land vehicles that are also exploding in number, thanks to the car companies that constantly tempt and coax Filipinos to buy more and more cars and motorcycles.

Added to the millions of vehicles owned by Metro residents are the vehicles going from North to South Luzon and vice versa, and are just passing through the streets of Metro Manila. They have no business in the city but they have no choice but to drive through it because the way from north to south and from south to north of Luzon is only through the bustling metropolis. There are only three roads connecting North and South Luzon: Rizal Avenue, Edsa and C-5. Even if you hate going through the traffic jams of the city, you have no choice, you have to inch through them.

Added to the giant cargo trucks and private vehicles going north and south are the thousands of provincial buses that add to the traffic jams. The Metro Manila Development Authority made things worse by reserving one lane of Edsa for provincial buses and even giving them loading/unloading stations in the middle of the busy streets. Being provincial buses, shouldn’t they stop at the city boundaries and let city buses, which are already plentiful, take the passengers to the inner cities?

As for cargo, the revival of the railroad (the DoTC should help the Philippine National Railway to quickly revive the North-South lines) should prevent giant cargo trucks from adding to the traffic jams.

Among the most congested by cargo trucks are the streets going to and from North and South Harbors. Thousands of container cans are hauled through the narrow streets, blocking them from use by other vehicles.

But there is an existing rail line from the piers to Caloocan and beyond. Why not revive this line so that cargo can be transported from the piers by rail cars to other points where they can be transferred to other rail cars and trucks that would take them to their final destinations? That would relieve the narrow streets of Manila of the giant container vans.

As for transporting people, we have the Pasig River and other waterways, as well as the sea, to do that. There already is a ferry on the Pasig River but not enough people are using it. The DoTC, local government units and the MMDA should help propagate its use. And the ferry should go all the way to the lakeshore towns of Rizal and Laguna. The trip to these towns would be much shorter and refreshing than the circuitous trip by land.

There used to be a ferry from the Luneta to Cavite. That was a faster and refreshing commute for Cavite residents working in Manila, but the service was stopped. Why? The government should help the ferry operators.

There also used to be a fast ferry service from the Cultural Center Complex to Bataan, but that, too, has been stopped. I understand the ferry wasn’t making enough money. Now people going to and from Bataan have to make the long circuitous land route.

In the old days, cargo (rice, salt, vinegar, nipa shingles, etc.) was shipped from Pampanga and Bulacan to Manila through the Tenejeros-Tullahan River on flat-bottomed barges called “cascos.” Residents of municipalities on the way waited on the banks of the river to buy some of their produce. The same river can still be used to ferry cargo and people to help relieve MacArhur Highway, Rizal Avenue, Edsa and C-5 of the cargo and human load—if the river can be rid of some of the pollution.

I read in the newspapers the other day of a plan to cleanse and revive dead rivers, of which the Tenejeros-Tullahan River is one. This river is not hard to cleanse because it begins and ends in Manila Bay. Therefore, it would be easy to flush out the polluted water every time the tides rise and ebb. All that is needed is to prevent the factories along it from dumping their effluents into it and squatters from dumping their garbage into the river and using it as their private toilets.

The Department of Public Works and Highways has constructed a concrete wall all along the banks of the river to prevent flooding. Why not extend and use the top of this river wall as roads to and from Bulacan? That would prevent squatters from building their shanties along the riverbanks and prevent residents from throwing their garbage into the river. And they would take some of the load away from MacArthur Highway.

The same can be done to the two banks of the Pasig River. They can be turned into streets leading to and from Rizal towns. Right now, these are just the unsightly backyards of factories and residences lined with squatter shanties.

But with riverside streets, these properties would have another frontage and their real estate value would rise tremendously and the government would be able to collect higher taxes. Better yet, they would prevent the pollution of the Pasig River and provide the metropolis with more streets.

Then the PNR’s commuter trains should be improved and increased so that commuters would use them instead of the three streets through the city. Then we should increase the number of coaches, trains and trips of the elevated rail lines, to transport more passengers.