You can barely see them gliding down the road at nighttime, mostly without any warning lights nor protective gear. Long boarders, skate boarders, skaters, and scooters appear to be increasing in number. They are thought of as a threat to road safety that an ordinance regulating them is being mulled at the City Council of Dumaguete.
The proposed law, authored by Councilor JV Imbo and co-authored by Councilors Jay-Jay Esmena and Dan Leon, seeks to disallow these activities from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
To help the City Council in creating the law, they held a well-attended public hearing last Wednesday at City Hall where several views were expressed.
The long boarders said they are not just sports buffs but they use their equipment as a form of transport, justifying their presence in the streets.
On the other hand, tricycle drivers said long boarders do not respect traffic laws, and simply zoom past intersections or hang on to the back of tricycles, unknown to the driver.
There have been some minor accidents involving these long boards, and we shouldn’t wait for more serious accidents before we put sanity back on our streets.
If long boarders are to use their equipments as sports equipment, they should not be doing their sports on the main thoroughfares of the City. There should be a designated area of them.
If they say they use their equipment as a form of transport, they should follow traffic rules. They should wear protective gear and stop at intersections.
Another possible compromise between the City and the long boarders is the implementation of Executive Order 774, which requires the government to create a system that “shall favor non-motorized locomotion and collective transportation systems (walking, bicycling, and the man-powered mini-train).”
The call for the implementation of EO 774 gives the road back to the people, or the 98 percent of the population who do not own cars, by dividing the roads in half and letting the walkers, bikers, long boarders and runners occupy the other half.
A petition has been submitted to the Supreme Court by people belonging to the Road Sharing Movement just last month, and a decision is expected to come out soon.
It may be a good idea for the Council to consider the creation of walkable roads ahead of the Supreme Court ruling, to encourage Dumaguetenos to adopt a healthy lifestyle by walking around town, and avoiding the use of motorized vehicles, thus, cutting down on our carbon footprint, and making Dumaguete not just a University Town but a Green City.
