50 ‘express buses’ roll out on Mar. 16

MANILA, Philippines—The government’s newest strategy for easing traffic on Edsa will be implemented starting on March 16 with the deployment of 50 “express buses,” officials announced on Wednesday.

The buses which will make only two stops—at the pickup point for passengers and at their destination—will initially ply just two routes for a month.

These are Fairview in Quezon City to Ayala Avenue in Makati City and vice versa, and from Fairview to the Ortigas business district in Pasig City and vice versa.

“It’s a pilot project. If it is good and people will appreciate it, let’s do it,” Transportation Secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya told reporters at the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) headquarters on Wednesday.

MMDA Chair Francis Tolentino told reporters in a separate interview that should the project, aimed at “[promoting] passenger convenience” like the express buses in Singapore, be successful, it may be expanded to include other areas.

He did not say where in Ortigas the express bus terminal would be located as he also told reporters that authorities were set to talk to mall operators about finding a spot for the Ayala terminal.

In a separate ambush interview, Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) Chair Winston Ginez told reporters that they were considering including a midway stop in Tandang Sora, Quezon City, to allow the express buses to pick up or unload other passengers.

Ginez said that based on discussions among the technical working group formed by the MMDA, DOTC and LTFRB, they were considering allowing the buses to make a second stop if these were only 60 percent full. This, however, has yet to be finalized.

According to Tolentino, the buses, which will be of uniform color, will ply their routes the whole day starting at 5 a.m. They will also be exempted from the number coding scheme and follow a schedule of departure.

The MMDA, DOTC and LTFRB are hopeful that the express buses will reduce the travel time from Quezon City to Makati by around 30 minutes.

Abaya said that he was thinking of requiring the buses to offer Wi-Fi services and have a Global Positioning System unit installed so that these could be tracked.

“We really want this to be a better bus service so that slowly, we upgrade our bus service,” he said, noting that so far, “roughly 10 to 15 operators were interested in participating” in the project.

Asked how much the buses would charge, Abaya said that they were still finalizing the fare matrix.