Learning from Manila’s traffic woes

Learning from Manila’s traffic woes

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Let’s be realistic. There is nothing that anyone can do to solve the traffic woes of Metro Manila, even with the ingenuity and hard work of MMDA or DOTC kingpins.

Here’s why.

With its current population of more than 12 million that swells to about 15 million during the daytime, Metro Manila is the undisputed primate city in the country whose close competitors such as Metro Cebu (2.5 million) or Metro Davao (2.2 million) pale in comparison in terms of population size.

According to a World Bank report, Metro Manila currently houses 56 percent of the total urban land development, and more than 70 percent of the total urban population of the country. 

Worse, three of its 16 cities — Manila‘s 42,857 people/km2; Pateros’ 30,456 people/km2; and Caloocan’s 27,916 population/km2 — rank as the top three densest cities in the world respectively dwarfing Mumbai’s 23,000 people/km2; 20,150 people/km2 in Paris; or Tokyo’s 10,100 people/km2.

Now you tell me.  How do you manage that?

The incidence of thousands of commuters and motorists spending long hours stuck in a traffic jam especially after torrential rains and consequent flooding is a given. We should not have the illusion that our existing and on-going efforts will ameliorate our traffic problem once and for all. Metro Manila’s state of urban affairs is like what the legendary Yogi Berra used to quip: “It’s déjí  vu all over again.”

By now, we should have already learned our lesson that no amount of urban revitalization or urban renewal can remedy the unsustainable and cancerous growth of our leading primate city, short of depopulating or wiping out the entire metro area and starting from scratch. 

Unfortunately, there is no other way but to find the political solution to our endemic problem of overdevelopment and underdevelopment.

I say political solution because the master planning, engineering, or architectural components to development are the easiest tasks to do. For me, it’s not difficult to plan and design a medium-range or long-range growth center plan. It’s not a problem at all. But engaging in a political solution is. And that’s an entirely different ballgame.

Both in my academic work and urban planning consultancies, I have consistently espoused the re-rooting of the development of our islands to the origins of the city-state that the classical Greeks talked about. And I advocated the role of growth points and maritime development employing innovative and sustainable urban designs consistent to the natural and social characteristics of our island nation.

What is interesting about city-state planning is that we don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Already, we have successful models to learn form. In fact, the relative successes of Monaco, Macau, Hong Kong, or Singapore can be traced to the application of the city-state model of development.

Unfortunately, there are people who have the planning skill and expertise like me but do not possess the motherboard of city or town planning. In short, someone has to exercise the political will to fulfill the vision of a new development from the beginning to the end.

In the case of Dumaguete City, since a huge chunk of its miniscule total land area (33.62 square kilometers or 12.98 square miles) is taken up by roads, land constraints and competing needs of a growing population (currently at 3,907/km2) will always create the perpetual traffic jam.

For now, having so many trucks, cars, and motorbikes is a terrible and illogical choice for a land-starved City.

Unless, over the next five years the City’s leaders will protect its coast and expand more land, and design public transport alternatives to promote a unified and coordinated pedestrian-oriented society where people will have the option to happily choose to walk, run, or bike.

It’ll be interesting to find out who among our political honchos, local as well as national, possess — and can articulate — the vision and the determination to finally implement the long- overdue, serious, no-nonsense, and non-distracted development of well-planned, decentralized, and sustainable growth poles.

Anyone?

Dr. Efren N. Padilla
Hayward, California
[email protected]

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