IT was a great idea – a landport at the edge of Metro Manila, on the Coastal Road in Parañaque City, where all public transport from Cavite and Batangas would stop, the same way that ships would stop at the Manila North and South Harbors and passenger and cargo planes at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport.
The idea was to keep thousands of buses from adding to the traffic jams in Metro Manila. They would unload all their passengers at the Paranaque Integrated Terminal Exchange (PITX) and return the way they came, this time with province-bound passengers.
The PITX was built by Megawide subsidiary MWM Terminals, Inc., working closely with the Department of Transportation (DoTr), and affiliated agencies, including the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB), and had a 35-year concession to build the terminal and operate it.
The PITX did keep so many vehicles out of Metro Manila. But the planners forgot one thing – the incoming passengers – about 250,000 daily – had no ride to their destinations all over Metro Manila. It was such a modern landport with so much space for the discharge of passengers from Cavite and Batangas. But there were no buses or jeeps of UV vehicles or trains to carry them onward, even if only to Baclaran where Metro Manila vehicles were available along with MRT and LRT trains.
The LTFRB came up with an emergency solution – exemption of several bus companies from the ban so that some 300 bus firms were allowed to continue on to Baclaran, raising howls of protest from the banned companies. The very idea of the landport – keeping provincial buses from adding to Metro Manila’s traffic – has thus been abandoned.
Last November, the Metro Manila Development Authority told provincial bus companies to start vacating their terminals along Epifanio de los Santos Ave. (EDSA) as its North and South terminals are now being constructed in Valenzuela City and Sta. Rosa, Laguna, and will be completed early next year. The 2,000 provincial buses from the north will have to stop in Valenzuela City, while the 2,500 buses from Laguna and beyond will have to stop in Sta. Rosa.
Before any further action on this plan of the landports to keep provincial buses from entering Metro Manila, the officials concerned, led by those of the Department of Transportation, should go through the entire plan, to ensure that the problems that have come up with the Paranaque landport are solved and are not repeated in the other terminals now going up in Valenzuela City and Sta. Rosa.
The easing of Metro traffic is a laudable goal but it must not be solved at the expense of thousands of workers who need to get to their offices and factories on time.
