Bring in the buses!

THE worsening traffic situation in Cagayan de Oro City is not unique for a growing metropolis. Cagayan de Oro is even being groomed now by President Rodrigo Duterte to become a Metro Cagayan de Oro area.

By being a Metro Cagayan, the surrounding barangays and economic centers of the province of Misamis Oriental will become part of an industrial and commercial complex and the city will be the hub.

And the traffic woes will be aggravated and become a sore thumb that needs to be remedied. A traffic jam will cause billions of pesos in losses each year. The traffic problem of Metro Manila will be replicated here, and the hopelessness of the situation will be magnified in the years to come.

Of the several solutions to the traffic mess, one is the deployment of buses as public transport. These huge, double-decked buses can accommodate  about 140 passengers comfortably. Thus, if there are 14 passengers of an ordinary jeepney, one bus can carry the passengers equivalent to that of ten jeepneys. Just imagine how much reduction in vehicles on the streets can be effected if public buses are deployed to transport passengers every day.

Put in 100 buses all over the Metro Cagayan de Oro to ply the routes from Jasaan on the east and Laguindingan on west and Manolo Fortich on the south, and all over the city center from Indahag and Lumbia, from Iponan and Bulua and from Bugo and the port area. These 100 buses can carry a total of 14,000 passengers at any given time, and result to the removal of 1,000 jeepneys and vans off the streets!

Not only will the 100 buses take 1,000 jeepneys off the roads but it will also considerably reduce air pollution each day of the year.

The most benefitted group will be the riding public as the fare of the buses will be considerably reduced. If the fare from Bugo to Agora terminal is 25.00 pesos on the jeepney and another 8.00 from Agora to Divisoria, the bus fare will be about 12.00 pesos, or less than one-half all the way to Divisoria on a single ride. Multiply that to twice a day for each ordinary passenger and multiply again with 26 days a month, will amount to more than a thousand pesos a month per person.

If there are five members per family, that should be more than 5,000 pesos in savings each month or more than 60,000 pesos per year!

And who should operate and run the buses? The city government of Cagayan de Oro can operate it, or any cooperative among the constituents of the city can enter into a joint venture to start it. That should give thousands of jobs to the jeepney drivers who will lose their jobs with the eradication of the jeepneys.

This public bus system has long been unseen or not considered as a very viable solution to the traffic mess. Maybe Kag. Zaldy Ocon and Atty. Egay Uy and Engr. Nonito Oclarit will see the practicality of this solution.

We can then be markedly observed on the traffic maps of the world as one city who implemented the Public Bus System and eased the traffic jams of one Metro City. And Kag. Ocon and the City Council will be remembered as the honorable gentlemen who solved, in one fell swoop, a monstrous traffic jam.

E-mail: ajpallugna@gmail.com