MMDA to impound non-OBR buses

Public utility bus companies that failed to register or have their units tagged for the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority’s organized bus route (OBR) scheme will be impounded on suspicion of being colorums, agency officials said yesterday.

MMDA General Manager Robert Nacianceno said that starting today, traffic enforcers will flag down all buses plying the EDSA route without "tags," or proof of registration in preparation for the implementation of the OBR on Monday.

Reports reaching Nacianceno’s office revealed that only 1,700 of the 3,000 buses on EDSA have registered for the scheme.

"This means that only 56 percent of buses have registered for the OBR. The remaining 1,300 units have either failed to register or are not going to be registered at all because mabubuking sila na colorum sila," he said.

Nacianceno said the MMDA gave bus owners and operators until Oct. 12 to have all their units listed under the OBR.

"Starting this weekend, our traffic enforcers will be on the lookout for buses that continue to defy the new OBR rules and still pass EDSA," he said. "We will throw the book on these drivers and operators who deliberately ignored the deadline on the pretext that their units have conked out."

Nacianceno said the MMDA is aware that some parties intend to sabotage the scheme.

The MMDA’s OBR will be implemented on EDSA on Monday in an effort to control the number of buses using the 26-kilometer highway at specific times of the day.

If the scheme succeeds, MMDA Chairman Bayani Fernando expects the flow of traffic to dramatically improve and that a disciplined bus dispatching system would benefit both bus operators and commuters.

The OBR is also being eyed as one of the solutions to the country’s energy problem since less buses on EDSA would mean less fuel consumption. – Michael Punongbayan