Pasig City makes busy streets safer for bikers

FOR BIKERS ONLY Pasig is putting up bike lanes and extending sidewalks on Caruncho, Market and Amang Rodriguez Avenues, major arteries in the city, for the protection of residents using the environment-friendly form of transport. —GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE

MANILA, Philippines — Pasig City is doubling down on its status as the most bike-friendly city in Metro Manila, working amid the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) this week to introduce new bike lanes a month after it deemed the two-wheelers an essential form of transportation.

Pasig Transport, the city’s transport development and management office, said that since Sunday, it had started adding bike lanes and extending sidewalks on Market, Caruncho and Amang Rodriguez Avenues, major arteries in the city.

Market Avenue is located in the area of Pasig Mega Market, the city’s principal market, while Caruncho Avenue takes civil servants and other front-line workers to the city hall complex.

Pasig was the first local government in April to recognize biking as a necessary means of transport through Executive Order PCG-18 and City Council Resolution No. 59, which had deep implications for those forced to work despite the ECQ in which all forms of public transport were banned.

Most notably, the twin orders paved the way for road repairs and the reopening of bicycle shops that had been considered nonessential and thus forced to close when the lockdown began. There are at least 25 bicycle shops in Pasig, according to the group MNL Moves.

“Cycling and light electric transport has been a method to maintain mobility of citizens while social distancing is implemented,” read the resolution, which said such transportation would assist in “mitigating and controlling the effects of [the new coronavirus disease] COVID-19.”

Bicycles were previously distributed by the local government to front-line personnel.

The move to extend sidewalks was also an acknowledgment that the ECQ had forced residents to increasingly resort to walking—a perilous way of getting to places in a capital that has been referred to as one of the world’s least walkable cities.

At the House of Representatives, Marinduque Rep. Lord Allan Velasco on Wednesday called on his colleagues to support the proposed “Bisikleta Para sa Kinabukasan (Bicycles for Tomorrow)” Act, which would create a national bike program and promote bike-friendly communities nationwide.

House Bill No. 4493 seeks to establish the proper infrastructure to make biking in the country’s roads safe for all.

“Post-quarantine scenario, we see biking as the primary mode of transportation of our people owing to the limited public transport aimed at ensuring social distancing,” the chair of the House energy committee said in a statement.

Under Velasco’s proposal, lanes exclusive for bicycles shall be established in all primary and secondary roads to allow cyclists to traverse across all towns and cities nationwide.

Designated bike lanes shall also be separated by a physical barrier and pavements shall bear visible markings.

“In cases where the installation of a physical barrier or elevated path is not feasible, the lane for bicycles shall be identified through [reflective] yellow painted lines. However, bicycle lanes must never compromise the mobility and safety of pedestrians,” according to the bill.

Cyclists, on the other hand, shall be required to bike within the designated lanes, unless no bike lane has been established yet, as well as obey all traffic rules and regulations, except those which are not applicable to bicycles.

Velasco’s bill mandates all public places, government offices, schools, malls, banks, restaurants and hospitals, among others, to provide bicycle racks for parking, which should be visible, secure and accessible without obstructing the way devoted to pedestrians or motor vehicles.