Aquino stops Edsa rehab

Come May, the 23 kilometer-long stretch of Edsa —the busiest thoroughfare in Metro Manila—is no longer in danger of turning into the country’s biggest parking lot.

Following a meeting with several Cabinet members, President Benigno Aquino III on Wednesday ordered that plans for the rehabilitation of Edsa be temporarily put on hold due to the inconvenience it would pose to motorists.

The repair project which was supposed to start in May would have caused taxpayers a whopping P3.7 billion.

“President Aquino instructed further study of the Edsa rehabilitation plan, including additional measures to mitigate inconvenience to motorists,” deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte said in a text message.

When contacted by the Inquirer, Valte said in a phone interview that the President was well aware of the impact of doing major road repairs on the busiest highway in the metropolis.

Mr. Aquino made the decision following a meeting at Malacañang on Wednesday with Public Works Secretary Rogelio Singson and one of his undersecretaries, Alfredo Tolentino; Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) Chair Francis Tolentino; Transportation Secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya; Budget Secretary Florencio Abad; Trade Secretary Gregory Ong; Communications Secretary Ricky Carandang and Valte.

“The instruction really came from the President,” Valte said when asked if the directive was prompted by a suggestion made by any of the Cabinet members.

“He was really concerned about the [longer] travel time, inconvenience, etc. that these repairs would entail,” she added.

Following the President’s order, no funding for the rehabilitation plan would be allocated to the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) or MMDA, Valte said.

Singson earlier announced that the rehabilitation of Edsa would be done in three phases with the first phase involving the stretch from Roxas Boulevard in Pasay City to Julia Vargas Avenue in Mandaluyong City.

“While we’re working on Phase 1, the rest of Edsa will be open and traffic in those areas will be normal,” he assured the public in a radio interview.

The repair work was expected to take 23 months under the DPWH’s Urgent Infrastructure Development Project in time for the World Economic Forum in 2014 and the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in 2015. It is also part of the department’s commitment to improve all auxiliary roads by 2014 and all secondary roads in 2016.

Under the rehab plan, all damaged concrete pavements would be replaced to ensure road stability and its carrying capacity. Once completed, Edsa would soon become as “smooth” as the North and South Luzon Expressways, Singson said.

Last Friday, the Metro Manila Council unanimously approved the plan’s implementation and the MMDA said it would map out alternate routes to prevent traffic from worsening.