Inferno's Manila

(Part 2)

“The most densely populated city on earth.”  Rather than fretting over Dan Brown's infamous descriptions of Manila in his latest book, Inferno, why don't we learn from this episode and hope something good come out of it.  I haven't heard anybody concluding that the “the most densely populated city on earth,” “six-hour traffic jams,” “suffocating pollution,” and “a horrifying sex trade,” comments are absolutely not true.  Hence, the fretting.  What the author simply did was exaggerate certain truths of certain conditions in certain areas of Manila, through a certain fictional character whose opinion can certainly be different from another.

Let's start with the first, and the most strange among the four comments - “the most densely populated city on earth.”  Apparently, judging from the subsequent enumerated conclusions, this is bad.  But if we start reading current trends in urban development, that is not the case.  On the contrary, contemporary urban theories nowadays conclude that higher density cities are more sustainable than low density cities.  In recent years, we are hearing more of such concepts as “new urbanism,” and “smart growth,” developed premised on raising urban densities.

Enrique Peñalosa, former mayor of Bogotá, Columbia, said, “Density is not bad….Bogotá also has a very high density (200 inhabitants++ per hectare).”  Peñalosa built TransMilenio, Bogotá's famous bus rapid transit (BRT) system, more than a decade ago, at a time when nobody thought it would work and the only operational one was Rede Integrada de Transporte, the BRT of Curitiba, Brazil, built in 1974.  And if we research further, we'll realize that “densification,” the process of increasing densities, is always coupled with increasing mobility through good and efficient urban public transport.  Hence, the link between the BRT and sustainable cities.

But we do have to understand the term “population density” itself, a little bit more precisely.  Okay, so it's simply the total population over land area.  Of what?  The concept of density is based on the law of averaging; it similar to the statistical “mean.”  It is a way to describe “in general” something which is seldom true in particular or in detail.  We can say that the Philippines has about 97 Million population with a land area of 300,000 sq.m., giving a population density of 308 persons/sq.km. But that seldom means anything useful.  It would be extremely difficult to find any part of the country with exactly that same density.

Or take the case of Manila.  The density of the City of Manila and Metro Manila are very different (42,800 vs. 18,500, as compared the country's 308).  What compounds the equation is the fact that population is not constant over time - even a few hours will spell the difference.  Population densities are always computed using residence information - where people live.  In the case of Cebu City, that's 860,000 with a density of 2,700 persons/sq. km.  But the actual number of people swell to over a million during the day!

The daytime density is important because it is during this time when people need urban services the most - many things do not matter so much when people sleep.  And the other descriptives (6-hour traffic jams, suffocating pollution) are also prevalent during the day.  Of course, the horrifying sex trade is mainly a night time occurrence, as we all know.  But a lot of misunderstanding about population density figures and their importance in urban planning, is the fact that we always use the “night-time” figures when it's the daytime numbers we need.

As Peñalosa said, density is not bad.  In fact, it is nowadays, a development goal, something urban managers aspire for, for more efficient and livable cities.  But the key to these desirable “dense” urban concepts are walkable urban public space and efficient public transport.  The latter, on the other hand is best provided, if we look at urban densities and how they “morph” between night and day, that is, from where the densest residential areas are to the densest working zones during the day.  Back to the home-to-work trip concept.           

So, being considered one of the most densely populated cities on earth is not at all bad.  In fact, if you go back to that Wikipedia list where Manila got No. 1, in the top 25 are four cities from France, one from Greece and one from Belgium.  Density, per se, is not bad, but actually quite good.  It's how we support the density by the right urban policies that make the difference.  (To be continued...)