Yesterday was my first time in a long time that I experienced the massive traffic along the Banilad-Talamban Road because our Sons of David group, which usually holds a weekly Monday morning Mass at the Cebu Country Club held it instead in the residence of Gen. Mariano Baccay, Sr. at the Doña Rita Subdivision just beside the University of San Carlos Talamban Campus, which is the epicenter of the Ban-Tal traffic congestion.
I think traffic has improved in that area for the reason that when you reach the junction leading to the Cebu Memorial Park, motorists are made to decide whether to use the road towards Cempark or go straight, thus effectively splitting the traffic into two. While traffic was heavy, it was moving anyway.
However on my way back to my office, I noticed that the road leading towards the AsiaTown IT Park, which I opened during my terms in CITOM just across Paradise Village was closed. Now I don't know why CITOM closed that road and allowed motorists to turn right towards the IT Park across the Aboitiz Headquarters. Allowing motorist going to the IT Park to use that road will certainly reduce the number of vehicles passing the Banilad-Talamban Road. I suggest that CITOM open this road right away.
Meanwhile, the Cebu Property Ventures and Development Corp. was supposed to widen that road so it can effectively be a two-way road. But alas CPVDC did not make use of that road. This is the problem besetting our city planners, no one really is thinking along the lines of which roads need to be opened in order to ease traffic congestion.
Last week, the Cebu City Council wrote me a letter for me to appear as a resource person to speak during their Cebu City Council meeting last Wednesday. Unfortunately, I had my court hearing, which was extended that morning, so I could not go to the Cebu City Council. But when I met Mr. Bunny Pages days later, he told me that the meeting was rescheduled for Thursday, unfortunately no one called me that the meeting was moved. So I was a no-show for that meeting that I really wanted to attend.
At this point, I know that Mr. Pages was tasked to help in the Ban-Tal traffic problem, but so far they have only experimented in the No-Left Turn scenario, which is in my book, a band-aid solution to this traffic problem. So what are the long-term solutions to the Ban-Tal Road? Of course, road widening is one of the options, but would it solve the traffic problem? If you look into the traffic problem plaguing EDSA in Metro Manila, it is already an 8-lane road, yet it is still heavily congested.
If you ask me, there are only three solutions to the Ban-Tal Road. First is to freeze all construction along this road, which means people would have to find places to live or put up a building. I'm sure many people would oppose this. The second scenario is what we already said -road widening. But how much would this cost? I'm sure that the cost would be enormous.
Finally, one solution is to put a roadway on top of the entire Ban-Tal Road. Yes, something that you can see at the south Luzon Expressway or that portion from Alabang to Makati. If you ask me, this is a doable project as there are minimal road right-of-way problems to block this project. Of course, I reckon that the group that opposed the flyover projects in Metro Cebu would oppose this, as they want Cebu to look nice without huge infrastructure running overhead. But if you ask me, we must bite the bullet and move forward rather than block or oppose any future plans for Ban-Tal.
Meanwhile, traffic along M. Velez has finally eased now that the road widening there is nearing completion. But sad to say, there seems to be no hope for the traffic problems of the highly-congested Escario St. Actually 10-years ago, we already came up with the plans for a parallel road to Escario St. from the University of the Philippines (Lahug Campus) all the way to the Barangay Hall of Guadalupe.
The Department of Public Works and Highways has already seen this plan, but somehow there was no one pushing to fund this project, which entails the construction of two bridges - one for the Lahug Creek and another for the Guadalupe River. I don't know what has happened to this project because I'm no longer involved in the Regional Development Council. But if you want to decongest Escario St. this project is the best way to do it because motorists going to the AsiaTown IT Park from Guadalupe will not need to pass through Escario St. anymore.
At this point I would like to suggest that a super body, perhaps with the assistance of MEGA Cebu be the official planner for the future of which roads should be opened, widened or diverted so that it frees CITOM to do its day-to-day task of handling our traffic problems. In fact I suggest that this should be a Metro Cebu-wide body because whether we like it or not, bad traffic in Mandaue City affects the traffic in Cebu City much as the same way that traffic in Cebu City affects the City of Talisay.
So let's just do it!