EDITORIAL - Enforce the law

Investing in closed-circuit television cameras for all the major thoroughfares of Metro Manila is a good idea, to improve compliance with traffic rules. Along Commonwealth Avenue, dubbed the “killer highway” due to the high incidence of fatal accidents involving speeding vehicles, CCTVs can be augmented with the installation of traffic rumble strips.

The rumble strips could take the fun out of car racing. The CCTVs, however, will be useless if no one is watching the monitors. The cameras will go the way of traffic lights and rules in this country – numerous but often ignored by both motorists and law enforcers. Along EDSA for example, compliance with designated lanes and stops is haphazard. The number of lanes doesn’t matter; the intersection of EDSA and McKinley in Makati, for example, is wide enough but the area on both east- and west-bound lanes are virtual bus terminals, with only a lane or two left for other vehicles to pass. The same is true of the southbound lane of Roxas Boulevard in front of the Redemptorist church in Baclaran, Parañaque.

Drivers and operators of public buses and jeepneys will not dare defy traffic rules if these are being enforced. But if those tasked to enforce the rules are too lazy or corrupt to do their job, even the most advanced CCTV system will not work to improve traffic management in Metro Manila.

If the CCTVs are procured, authorities must also make sure the contracts will be aboveboard and the products will work as expected. Not too long ago the government bought supposed “smart” traffic lights. Motorists never saw the smartness of the system. Taxpayers who footed the bill appeared to have been outsmarted by those who procured the lights.

Once the CCTVs are installed and traffic violators are caught on camera, they must be apprehended and appropriate penalties imposed. CCTVs are just meant to improve traffic management. There is no substitute for actual law enforcement.