December 27, 2007 · Posted in: Investigative Reports
Too many buses, too many agencies clog Edsa
THE combined Yuletide and New Year holidays turn Edsa into a nightmare for commuters, as even those who live outside the metropolis drive to the city to do their shopping. But even on normal, uneventful days, motorists think twice before venturing into the national capital region’s major highway, which goes through six cities. For who would want to join the wretched souls who are often at risk of spending two to three hours just to get from end to end of what used to be known as Highway 54, just because of heavy traffic?
One of the reasons cited for the continued clogging of Edsa is the huge volume of buses that are often just half-full. While private vehicles outnumber buses, the lack of discipline of bus drivers has made them target for regulation. And therein lies another reason for the gridlock: the various agencies with varying rules in an attempt to decongest Edsa, and the creative ways by which bus companies are able to violate these rules.
In this report, PCIJ fellow Margaret Jao-Grey reports on the many past, present and future efforts to ease traffic on Edsa.
Read on at pcij.org.
7 Responses to Too many buses, too many agencies clog Edsa
naykika
December 27th, 2007 at 3:22 pm
Until the governments of Metro Manila in co-operation with the National Government takes over the responsibilities and be ready to subsidize the Mass Transit System of the Whole Metro Manila Area, I can’t see any solutions to traffic gridlock and the improvement of mass transit stocks.
Been to NYC and it’s mass transit system is moving millions of passengers daily very efficiently in and around the Suburbs 24 hours a day. In Toronto, most leave their “private” cars at home and use the Public Transport to work and in and out of the city and surrounding cities.
That way the city itself can regulate the movement of all public vehicles according to the riding public demands and may have to also regulate commercial vehicles at a certain times of day for efficient movement of Public Transport. And there is only one Agency regulating all of the operations…
boymejorada
December 28th, 2007 at 2:29 pm
I agree with naykika that there is a need to place the mass transport system of Metro Manila under one authority. Private bus companies and jeepneys must not be allowed to operate within the metropolitan area. The government should provide MetroRail and bus services to be able to control the number of vehicles on the road. At the same time, we could adopt a schedule of trips for certain routes to further limit the volume of traffic. In many countries of Europe, the tram is a common form of transportation. It can take the place of the jeepney. And finally, people should learn how to walk the shorter distances.
urbanodelacruz
December 31st, 2007 at 3:01 am
Margie Grey’s article on the travails of the public bus system in Metro Manila was (characteristically) well researched and gives a quick overview of the confusing governance of traffic numbers involved in the PUB system. Thank you, Margie, for pointing out that private vehicles outnumber PUBs 9 to 1. A viable traffic solution must involve reducing private car use -and that can only be accomplished by providing more efficient public transport.
Margie’s article does fail to account for the role of the economic model of PUBs in the behavior of bus drivers. I believe this less an oversight of the reporter than it is a serious blindspot among our policy makers.
We seem to have taken the “boorish behavior” of buses on EDSA as a given, taken it as function of (at best) a lack of driver education, or (more often_ as a lack of discipline among bus drivers. But bus drivers behave the way they do, drive the way they do because of the economic drivers (no pun intended) behind their occupation.
The “boundary” or commission system (“12 percent commission if daily earnings are P10,000 or less and 14 percent if earnings are more than P10,000”) dictates the driving behavior as surely as confusing layers of governance on EDSA.
The Boundary System is basically a vehicle rent system. The driver is “hired” by the transport operator, to run and maintain his jeep, bus, or FX cab. The driver can run as many trips within the boundary period (standard is 12 hours) as he wants but he basically has to pay the “boundary fee” (usually, daily) to the owner -and his source of income is whatever he makes over and above the boundary fee. The driver covers the cost of gasoline and minor repairs.
The boundary system brings a logic to earning money that shapes the driving habits of the renting drivers. If the driver only earns above the boundary, then logic dictates that he must get as many passengers as he can in as many trips as possible . The driver also benefits by having the vehicle on the road as many days as possible – as repairs and shutdowns mean no income for the day.
So, a driver will:
1. soak up passengers by basically waiting as long as he can in a high traffic/passenger volume area and then
2. speed up to the next high volume pickup point to soak in more passengers.
3. he will also see other public utility vehicles plying the route as competition so waiting in a line does not make much sense,
4. he will try to get ahead of the line (usually by doubling up on the pickup lane) so he can be closer to the “source” of passengers and so
5. he won’t be tied down on the line and can speed up to the next destination.
6. It also means that shorter trips are preferred to longer trips and
7. vehicle downtime and thus vehicle maintenance is kept to a minimum (=inefficient engines, =more pollution).
This system is behind the traffic chokepoints at the major junctions and intersections of our cities. (I’ve written extensively about how our disorganized public transport system has shaped the built fabric and the quality of life in our metropolis.)
We’ve thrown good money after bad in countless traffic control and traffic discipline systems to try to get the “boorish behavior” under control. The OBR is just the latest incarnation (remember Oscar Orbos’ sticker system?).
I find it amusing that Director Lantion thinks that getting buses to compete on “brand” will be the best approach to getting better traffic behavior from our PUBs.
Changing the economic model – to a salary based system, where the driver’s income is NOT based on how many passengers he can pick up, will change driver behavior overnigh and will restore sanity to flow of PUBs on EDSA even without the expensive RFID systems.
Benjamin de la Pena
a.k.a –Urbano dela Cruz
boymejorada
December 31st, 2007 at 5:30 pm
Urbano de la Cruz is right, bus drivers should be paid fixed salaries to bring sanity into the public transport system, even if just limited to the EDSA route. This supports the view that the EDSA bus route should be taken over by the MMDA. For as long as the bus operators pursue the profit motive, the problems will persist. This is a service operation that should be run by government, in which quality of the service, and not profit, is the bottom line.
naykika
January 1st, 2008 at 12:20 pm
As Governments and people the world over are more concern now of Global warming and emission from motor vehicles is the major cause of pollution, it’s about time to think Mass Transit System as a non-profit and a government run system. A 50-50 proposition is ideal. Half users fees thru fares by passengers and half thru governments’ subsidies and that could also be raised thru tolls from private and commercial vehicles using public roads. the payback is efficient commerce and wasteful time of thousands of workers tied up in traffic in and off to work.
naykika
January 1st, 2008 at 12:25 pm
I meant to say the elimination of wasteful time of going in and off to work of thousands of workers day in and day out..and that also the minimising of unnecessary burning of precious fossil fuel while tied up in traffic.
jrfr
February 13th, 2008 at 1:44 pm
Among other things, the government especially the LTFRB should look into why the number of franchises suddenly ballooned at more than 1,000 for jeepneys when the numbers were significantly lowered since the mid 1990’s. The same goes for the buses. The basis for the supply of public transport should be tied to a reliable estimate of demand. Maybe the basis for approving franchises are criteria that are no longer relevant today given that a transport network evaluation approach is necessary and more practical.