Trapped in gridlock

PERHAPS THE single most frustrating experience of a commuter in Metro Manila is the daily encounter with heavy traffic. Whether on main thoroughfares or side streets, one can meet monster traffic for all sorts of reasons, many somewhat avoidable. The situation is getting worse, and no solution is in sight.

It is not only getting caught in a gridlock that is exasperating; that no one is able to do anything about this problem experienced daily raises the frustration level to the extreme. The hours-long gridlock last Friday that led to air travelers missing their flights is just another excruciating example. Road diggings are causing, if not greatly compounding, the problem.

Flash flooding resulting from a sudden heavy downpour is a traffic-causing situation that clearly needs addressing. One heavy-rain day on Edsa corner Libertad just after the Edsa-Shaw Underpass, only two lanes out of six were passable because the water at the curb had reached above the car floor level. The flood drains must have been clogged in that 50-meter stretch because it was only in that spot where the four lanes could not be used, and two lanes were a risky pass even for buses. No troubleshooter came to check the cause of the flash flood.

Thus, southbound motorists stewed for hours in traffic. Had a crew from the Metro Manila Development Authority or a unit from Mandaluyong’s engineering department come to unclog the drain, the bottleneck could have eased for normal traffic flow, at least on that part of Edsa.

During morning rush hours, on the southbound lane after the Guadalupe bridge on Edsa, buses unload and/or load passengers using three of the six lanes, causing a bottleneck. The slow pace also extends far north: Ortigas, Crame, Cubao. In the afternoon rush hours on the northbound lane before crossing the Guadalupe bridge, buses again create a bottleneck and the traffic jam impacts Gil Puyat Avenue, Ayala Avenue and Magallanes. The bottleneck then builds up again as vehicles reach the front of SM Megamall, Araneta Center, Eton Centris Mall, Ayala’s Trinoma, SM North. The traffic flow is literally at a snail’s pace.

Malls are necessarily planned for efficient pedestrian and traffic flow. What plans are made for the flow in the road arteries going to and from them? The pedestrian loading and unloading zones for buses can be inadequate. On or during the weekends after payday, the sales result in a huge traffic jam extending to a 3-kilometer radius from the malls. To compound the gridlock, there is Robinson’s Galleria to the north, Podium in between, and Edsa Shangri-La, Greenfield Edsa Central Mall and Star Mall-Edsa to the south. With six major malls concentrated in Mandaluyong, Pasig and Quezon City, how can one not expect hours-long traffic during the afternoon rush hours or weekend sales? Mall owners and their clients may be happy, but what about the people at large just passing through?

Years ago, a Quezon City-Makati drive during the rush hour took between one hour and one-and-a-half hours. The return trip took about the same. Today, with the malls all over the Edsa-Shaw-Ortigas area, driving time of two-and-a-half hours to three hours seems the new normal.

The traffic problem is huge—a no-brainer, so to speak. Solving the problem is the hard part. But it does not have to be really hard. Reduce the volume of car park users by heavily charging them—say P500 for one-time use over and above what the mall charges. Discourage the use of cars by mallgoers through the local government’s taxing power. The collections made can be used on ways to mitigate traffic jams in and around the malls. Deploy more traffic enforcers or identify and develop shuttle points to start the mass movements of pedestrians going to malls.

To be sure, mall owners will complain that the volume of people will drop. If they do not want that to happen, then they must help work out solutions that can ease traffic in their areas of influence. If they will not help, they are part of the problem and they must be heavily taxed for causing external diseconomies generated by traffic jams.

Traffic jams have a big economic cost. Malls must share in this cost as the traffic problem will have costlier consequences when not addressed. It goes without saying that infrastructures must be planned and developed well.

In the same quadrant are big schools: Lourdes School, Poveda School, La Salle Green Hills, Immaculate Conception Academy and Xavier School. There is also the University of Asia and the Pacific. Tens of thousands of cars deliver and collect students of these schools every school day (or more than 200 days in a year). Schools with parents’ associations must be proactive in helping solve the traffic problem in their areas through major carpooling or bus shuttle programs. Otherwise, the local governments must use the taxing power to be able to manage the traffic problem for all concerned.

Take the Katipunan corridor with Ateneo de Manila University, Philippine School of Business Administration, St. Bridget’s College, Miriam College and the University of the Philippines. Traffic jams are routine fare there. Can there be no solution?

The point of this commentary is not to prescribe solutions for longstanding problems experienced daily without valid credentials to support the prescriptions. The point is for all stakeholders to get involved with finding solutions, or the government should use its taxing power to force everyone to do something. There must be solutions to traffic that everyone can agree with. Problems cannot be allowed simply to fester. All share a common road and the use of that road must cater to the common good. It’s time everyone got involved in being part of the solution, and stopped merely complaining about the problem.

Danilo S. Venida ([email protected]) holds undergraduate and postgraduate degrees from the University of the Philippines and the Center for Research and Communication/University of Asia and the Pacific. He is a former president of the Philippine Daily Inquirer and is now a business consultant.