WHICH government agency or agencies came up with the idea of rehabilitating EDSA, the highway connecting a number of cities in Metro Manila as well as to outlying northern and southern provinces?
We imagine it’s the Department of Public Works and Highways, Department of Transportation and the Metro Manila Development Authority that worked together on the rehabilitation plan.
The tri-agency project was really needed as we’re told that the last time the vital road artery in Metro Manila had undergone major repairs was 50 years ago.
Now, with a rapidly growing urban population and a corresponding increase in the number of public and private vehicles using EDSA on a daily basis, then the EDSA rehab project is truly an idea whose time has come.
But wait. There appears to have been a headlong rush to get the multi-billion road rehab project off the ground that the impact on the riding and motoring public and remedial measures to cope with the resulting traffic congestion for the two-year timeline of the project had not been adequately discussed.
The result, if the original two-year project duration were to be followed, would have been pure bedlam in EDSA and nearby thoroughfares as hours-long traffic would be the new normal, even if Transportation Secretary Vince Dizon had said that portions of the Skyway road project of San Miguel Corporation and the North-South Connector Road could be used by motorists for free to avoid the anticipated daily traffic jam along EDSA.
Aware of the potential carmageddon that the EDSA rehab project could cause, President Marcos Jr. has stepped in and ordered the agencies concerned to make a detailed plan for traffic rerouting before rehabilitation of EDSA could begin.
The postponement of the P8.7-billion rehabilitation of EDSA would remain in effect until “a solid rerouting plan” is proposed and local government units are fully ready, according to the Chief Executive.
“One of the things we have also focused on in the past few weeks is transportation. I earlier announced the temporary suspension of the Edsa rebuilding program. I said that two years is too long to bother our countrymen.,” the chief executive said.
“And until I see solid re-routing plans and I can be sure that the LGUs are well prepared, let’s not do it and fix the plan first,” he added.
The president’s decision is commendable following concerns raised by commuters about the inconvenience that the rehabilitation would cause. Rehabilitation was supposed to start in mid-June.
The EDSA rehabilitation aims to rebuild and reconstruct its 23.8-kilometer southbound and northbound lanes, which Department of Public Works and Highways said would cover 200 kilometers of lanes.
Given the scope of this project, the Transportation and Public Works departments should really go back to the drawing board and revamp their plan within a month. As the President has pointed out, there are more effective ways and new technology that we can use to finish the project ahead of time—and spare the hapless public and the economy of a two-year Carmageddon.
