‘BRT project still on track despite delays’

CEBU City’s proposed Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project will be resubmitted for approval in the third quarter of this year.

Rafael Yap, operations chief of the Cebu City Traffic Operations Management (Citom), said the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) will submit the city’s BRT project proposal to the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA).

He also maintained City Hall’s position that the BRT and not the Light Railway Transit (LRT) system remains the ideal mass transport system for Cebu City.

“Cebu City doesn’t have the necessary passenger volume to encourage that (LRT) kind of travel, according to the DOTC study,” he said in a speech before the Kiwanis Club yesterday.

The NEDA board chaired by President Benigno Aquino III deferred approval of the Cebu City BRT project until there is evidence that the project is feasible, given the city’s narrow roads.

The P211 million project will include a 16-kilometer stretch of road from Bulacao in the south to Talamban in the north passing by N. Bacalso Avenue, a portion of Osmeña Boulevard, N. Escario Street and Governor Cuenco Avenue.

The BRT project is expected to be completed in two years and can be operational in late 2015 or early 2016, Yap said.

“It’s a moving target date and despite the delay in project implementation it’s still within an acceptable level of delay,” said Yap.

Yap is confident that delays in the project implementation will not hamper the national government’s loan application with the World Bank.

“There are no indications that they are pulling out,” he said.

After his presentation with the Kiwanis Club, Yap met the city’s bike lane proponents.

The group that included Councilor Nida Cabrera, the council’s environment committee chairperson, still has to finish the bike lane feasibility study that they would submit to DOTC for funding assistance.

Cabrera proposed to pass an ordinance declaring certain city streets as bike lanes.

Other bike lane proponents include the Movement for Livable Cebu and the Critical Mass Cebu Bikers Organization.  Chief of Reporters Doris C. Bongcac