Solve traffic jams; increase traffic fines

We wrote the other day about the continued growth and development of Cebu City from the Cebu Country Club (which is no longer in the country) all the way to Barangay Pit-os and Agsungot, where it can only be reached by a very narrow road. Something must be done by the planners of Cebu City to ensure that this part of Cebu City would be developed properly, rather than in reaction to its rapid development. What we need is a good master plan. But who really has the master plan for Cebu City? I too haven't seen any; hence, it is time for the City of Cebu to get one!

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Talking about developments in the North District of Cebu City, I came upon a proposal by Rep. Raul del Mar who introduced House Bill no. 4400 that would eventually resolve an existing controversy involving the Cebu Country Club, where in a rare Supreme Court decision, it was ordained that the Cebu Country Club is owned by the government. To think that the government wasn't a litigant to that case? Here we are, two private individuals laying claim to that parcel of land, and in the end, both lost ownership of the land and it lands in the hands of the government? Where in heavens did this all go so wrong? The Cebu County Club belongs to the so-called "Banilad Friar Lands or Estate which at the turn of the Century, when the Spanish government left and our American colonizers took over, many of these church lands were distributed to people who wanted to buy them. Since Cebu was sparsely populated then, large tracts of these lands were bought by enterprising Cebuanos for a cheap price, as the government wasn't interested in making money from the sale of these church lands. Today, anyone who owns a piece of property that falls within the 2,000 hectare Banilad Friar Lands are keenly interested in the developments happening at the Cebu Country Club because henceforth, all Supreme Court decisions would be taken from this. So it is very easy to lose your property if you're not careful; hence, Rep. Raul del Mar saw the impending trouble and through his pending bill, he expects it would solve this controversy. All we now need to do is ask Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA) to certify the del Mar house bill as urgent and we can put this problem behind us.

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As I finished my column early evening Wednesday, I saw Vice-Mayor Michael Rama wearing what looked like a Darth Vader helmet at the corner of Mango Ave. and Juana Osmeña St. checking out the newly-restored traffic along the routes leading to the Redemptorist Church. The Vice-Mayor apparently took out a motorcycle to survey things for himself and as it turned out, traffic at 6PM on Wednesday was very light along that particular corner… but from our vantage point, we could see that traffic was obviously heavy along Foodarama. All I can say was, traffic was indeed back to normal, because the area nearest to the Redemptorist Church was jammed with vehicles, but this did not affect the Juana Osmeña side. What was crystal clear to us is that, the major cause of traffic congestion are those vehicles driven by mindless drivers who arrogate unto themselves a piece of real estate as if they owned that parking area all for themselves! This is why I strongly suggest to the Cebu City Council that it is time to increase traffic fines and violations. But more than just simply increasing these fines, the City Council must put a rider which points out that a driver who violates our traffic laws five times in one year would have his driver's license suspended for a month. That should do the trick! But then, whenever stiff traffic fines are being deliberated… guess who almost always troops to the City Council to oppose these moves? The militant jeepney drivers' organizations that insist that such heavy fines are oppressive to the lowly jeepney driver, who cannot afford to pay these stiff fines. Mind you, no one from the private sector or a car club ever appears on those public hearings and in the end, the Cebu City Council listens only to the jeepney groups and end up not increasing these traffic fines at all. But we know too well that the majority of those violations do not come from the jeepney drivers' groups, rather they are committed by car owners who could very well afford to pay those fines. So there you are… we are giving the Cebu City Council something to ponder on and think deeply. Traffic fines in the United States cost more than a hundred dollars per violation, no wonder only the rich fool or the stupid driver would dare violate their traffic rules.

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For email responses to this article, write to [email protected]. Bobit Avila's columns can also be accessed through www.thefreeman.com