QC gov’t to authorities: Reopen two Edsa intersections

Quezon City Mayor Joy Belmonte speaks during the inauguration of the Quezon City Molecular Diagnostics Laboratory located in Barangay Teachers Village East. (FILE) photo from QC-PAISD

MANILA, Philippines — The Quezon City government has appealed to authorities to reopen the Edsa-Muñoz Interchange and the Edsa-West Avenue-North Avenue Interchange to lessen the worsening traffic in those areas.

QC Mayor Joy Belmonte has sent a letter to the Department of Transportation, Metropolitan Manila Development Authority, and the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board to request the reopening of the two intersections in response to “numerous complaints” the local government received from motorists.

“While we fully support the national government’s transportation initiatives, particularly the EDSA Bus Carousel project, we have to do a balancing act so that we won’t compromise the welfare of those using EDSA,” Belmonte said in a statement on Tuesday.

The city government also suggested reopening some of the U-turn slots closed by the national government to give way to the EDSA Bus Carousel project.

After monitoring the Balintawak area, the city government determined that the bottleneck caused by the reduction of lanes from three to two, per direction, at the EDSA Balintawak Cloverleaf has resulted in heavy traffic at times reaching EDSA corner North Avenue.

Belmonte said traffic is expected to improve once their request is granted.

“We expect traffic to improve in those areas once our request is granted, especially with the Christmas rush and the easing of our GCQ guidelines,” she said.

“The city government is ready to work with authorities to find ways in improving the flow of traffic in intersections, U-turn slots and bus loading bays within the city,” Belmonte added.

In the meantime, the city government has deployed additional traffic enforcers in affected areas and coordinated with MMDA to open closed access roads so that vehicles coming from Quirino Highway will exit at NLEX/Camachile and divert vehicles exiting along Edsa towards Monumento.

The said measures reduced the congestion along the Edsa-Caloocan area, the local government claimed. It will likewise address the long queue of northbound vehicles along Edsa-Balintawak, QC government added.

Belmonte also assured that the Department of Public Order and Safety and other agencies of the local government will continue to explore solutions to traffic bottlenecks along the major roads within the city.

JPV