50,000 students to get hit by Baguio roadworks

WALKING has become the ideal mode of travel for residents and tourists who will spend Holy Week in Baguio City, due to 44 road repair projects in the summer capital. EV ESPIRITU/INQUIRER NORTHERN LUZON

BAGUIO CITY—Road works all over the city would ordinarily be forgiven this summer as classes had already ended in public schools and students are on vacation.

But not for three major universities, including their elementary and high school departments, which revised their academic calendar to end in May and will be reeling from clogged roads with the start of 16 of 44 road projects this month.

The University of the Philippines Baguio (UP Baguio), Saint Louis University (SLU) system, and University of Baguio (UB) have a combined student population of about 50,000.

Most of the other schools are spared the nightmare. They held their commencement exercises last week for the last batch of high school students who are not required to attend the senior high school program under the government’s K to 12 Basic Education Program.

Going to UP Baguio is a traffic nightmare nowadays. A major excavation project, meant to replace underground drains, had all but prevented vehicles from passing through.

Drainage excavation work on a portion of the road near the Baguio Cathedral and repair work on General Luna and Bonifacio Roads have slowed down inner city traffic leading to SLU, and its Sacred Heart Hospital, and to UB and nearby Notre Dame de Chartres Hospital.

Mayor Mauricio Domogan directed city employees to monitor the road projects to make sure contractors are on the job 24 hours a day to complete the projects, as the Holy Week brings a drove of tourists to the summer capital.

“We cannot stop the projects anymore so I asked the contractors to speed up their work,” Domogan told members of the city council at a meeting on Monday.

Domogan said he also required each contractor to designate traffic flag men to help ease the bottleneck.

Many university students have been walking to school since last week, instead of enduring the gridlock. Vincent Cabreza, Inquirer Northern Luzon