CEBU, Philippines - That’s what yesterday’s road closure was about. This, according to the traffic chief of the main city, was done in preparation for an international religious event come 2016. Seeing that this big event is scheduled for 2016 yet, it is safe for motorists to presume that there will be more and more of these ‘dry runs’ as the event draws nearer.
In all truth, none of the major cities of the province have to do scheduled dry runs for motorists to get used to snarled traffic and tests of patience. Almost everywhere and at almost every time in these cities, motorists have to bear with horrendous traffic conditions brought about by several factors.
First, there’s the poorly coordinated road repairs being done all over the Kapitolyo city. Currently, two of the three major northbound roads host non-stop bottleneck parties for all motorists. Technically not located in the same city but, the third northbound artery doesn’t fare any better as traffic is already pretty bad in that ‘corridor.’ Road repairs being done to these arteries are amazingly slow and have reduced these multi-lane thoroughfares into the size of carriage ways. What used to be a free flowing stretch of road is now crammed with scores of vehicles trying to edge each other out for that tiny entry point.
One may argue that the local traffic board mapped out alternate routes for vehicles to take to avoid these bottlenecks. True, but have you seen the condition these roads are in? I’ve seen golf course pins and hazards more even than those road surfaces. You have a choice of burning more fuel getting stuck in traffic, or wrecking your suspension negotiating the obstacle course they use as an alternate route.
The second factor that contributes to this growing traffic menace is poor vehicle regulation. If public utility vehicle franchises are supposedly scrapped after a vehicle has done fifteen years of service, why can’t we do the same to private and government vehicles? Let’s be practical. These older model vehicles have already done their fair share of service and have to be put out to pasture. And if we really are really intent to go green, junking these clunkers would greatly reduce the amount of carbon emission. Let us throw away those imported non-reliable, lemon, surplus vehicles too.
Finally, poor rush hour management. I have heard time and again that certain people in the traffic boards hold Masters Degrees in field of traffic management. Good on them. But it doesn’t take a college degree to figure out which roads build up horrendous traffic at certain times of the day. And it doesn’t take high school diploma to figure out that placing traffic enforcers who have logic and common sense in these areas would greatly decongest traffic.
I have had my fair share of being stuck in many beat-the-red-light traffic snarls to know that vehicular traffic would not build up if a traffic enforcer were present during all hours of “rush hour” regulating traffic flow. Unfortunately, that is not the case and we are stuck to fend for ourselves during these times.
On the flip side, it is good to know that all these factors are already conditioning motorists for traffic conditions that would make yesterday’s mess look like a walk in the park. As the coming 2016 event is religious in nature, maybe by then motorists would be more patient and forgiving.