Challenged over flyovers

Last Friday the TV program My Politics featured  an interview with Sen. Loren Legarda, the Liberal Party’s candidate who has been  topping election surveys.

Legarda clarified that she is running under  LP but remains a member of the National People’s Coalition (NPC).

Legarda told me and program co-anchor Eddie Barrita that she is supporting the Universal Health Care program of the administration that would provide health benefits to the poorest of the poor  who  don’t have a decent health care program.

Legarda is also  espousing  the Pantawid Tuition program  to provide a college scholarship for one member of every Filipino family.  This is one of the best programs from an administration candidate.

Senator Legarda has always ben passionate about her advocacies for  environment  protection and disaster preparedness and resiliency  to help Filipinos  know how to cope with  the effects of Climate Change.

Legarda is one candidate we shouldn’t forget together with former senator  Migz Zubiri who contributed to Cebu for the construction of the P30 million Pediatric Ward at the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center.

* * *

President Aquino was in Cebu last Friday to attend the proclamation rally of the Liberal Party mounted by the Bando Omseña-Pundok Kauswagan at the Capitol grounds, which  was well attended. In his speech, the President blamed Cebu City Mayor Mike Rama for the traffic congestion  he got into last Friday. But the president should be informed that  gridlock in most of the streets was directly caused by the closure of major roads near the Capitol grounds, specifically the portion of Osmena Boulevard, Escario Street, and M. Velez Street. Aquino  also apparently blamed the mayor for opposing the construction of new flyovers in Cebu City.

It’s not entirely true that the mayor opposed the construction of flyovers. He was against the rise of flyovers without  any comprehensive transport master plan in place. The position of Mayor Mike, civil society and the City Development Council was that if the  flyover stems from an approved master plan then by all means let’s put up another two-lane flyover.

Metro Manila is suffering  terrible traffic.  In the absence of a comprehensive transport master plan, many flyovers were  put up and traffic is still very bad.

We don’t want to make the same mistake in Cebu.

Let’s  make a logical first step to address the traffic problem by crafting a comprehensive master plan, implement   it  and see if experts recommend  building more flyovers in the city or in the outskirts.

President Aquino should view  the YouTube  video that compares  traffic flow at a  flyover in Banilad  and the traffic flow in an intersection of  the Ayala  Business Park where there’s a  flared intersection to  understand better the issues surrounding  flyovers.

The Movement for a Livable Cebu is leading the call for comprehensive transport master plan and initially opposed putting up more flyovers without this plan in place.Mayor Rama  supports this direction because it makes sense.

I hope the parties are not discouraged by the President’s statement and take more as a challenge to keep up their advocacy.