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Cabinet Secretary Jose Rene Almendras is now looking into the possibility of reducing the number of private vehicles plying EDSA days after the Philippine National Police-Highway Patrol Group (PNP-HPG) took over the traffic management of Metro Manila’s busiest thoroughfare.
Almendras, who was tasked to oversee the new traffic measures, said the increasing volume of new cars has added to the road congestion issue, aside from sidewalk vendors and unruly motorists.
“I think the reason why traffic got really bad was car sales were really something else,” he said in an interview with Lynda Jumilla on ANC’s Beyond Politics.
According to the secretary, 225,000 to 260,000 cars and 14,000 buses use EDSA daily. This is much higher than EDSA’s average daily capacity of 160,000 vehicles.
“The solution will be about efficiency. It’s possible that there will be carpool limitations, meaning cars with more passengers will be given priority over cars with single passenger,” Almendras said.
“Eventually, if the number of cars continues to grow, there will have to be some sort of restriction,” he added
Almendras also noted that addressing the metro traffic mess entails the improvement of mass transport system.
“We need to go to the reality that HOV (high-occupancy vehicle) is the efficient answer to congestion, that’s why we are fixing the buses,” he said.
He called on the bus operators and other motorists for cooperation as the government continues to work on the proposed traffic solutions.
This article has been re-published with permission from ABS-CBNnews.com.
