Is the "project of the century" solution to our traffic woes?

The Metro Manila Subway is set to begin construction before the end of 2019.  Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto Pernia has called it "the project of the century" for both Metro Manila and the Philippines.

The subway project comes with a P393 billion price tag and is seen as the solution to the traffic woes of Metro Manila. It will span a stretch of 35 kilometers with stations along Quezon Avenue, North Avenue, Katipunan Avenue, Ortigas, Bonifacio Global City, and the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) in Pasay City.

Increasing number of vehicles
Traffic in the metro has gotten worse and worse each year. In 2017 there were 10.4 million vehicles in the entire country registered with the Land Transportation Office. Out of this number, 2.6 million or one-fourth of all the total number of vehicles can be found in the National Capital Region. In 2018, the total number of registered vehicles in the country grew by 11.3% to a total of 11.6 million. With such a high rate of growth in the number of vehicles using our streets, it no longer comes as a surprise that our countries have become more and more congested.

High economic costs of traffic
According to Business World, as of 2017 EDSA is the National Capital Region's most traversed road with an average of 367,728 vehicles passing it daily. Two-thirds of this is made out of cars. While motorcycles up 11% of total amount. The remaining 11% is composed of buses, jeeps, and utility vehicles (UV).

Given the massive congestion in our major thoroughfares, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (Jica) estimates that the opportunity cost lost to traffic amounts to P3.5 billion a day. If left unresolved, Jica forecasts that this amount would continue to grow reaching P5.4 billion by 2023.

Subway answer to all our problems?
Having an efficient public transport system is one of the precursors to solving the problem of traffic. People can't be encouraged to leave their cars at home  and take the public transport system instead if the transport system keeps on breaking down or is inconvenient. To resolve this, the Philippines is set to build a state-of-the-art subway.

The subway line is expected to be a double, single track with a diameter of 6.8 meters. The trains are  expected to travel at speeds of 35.6 to 48.5 kilometers per hour.

According to Department of Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade, construction would begin before the end of 2019. Target opening for partial operations for its first three stations namely Quirino Highway, North Avenue, and Tandang Sora is 2022.

Phase 1 of the subway project has been awarded to the joint venture composed of Shimizu Corporation, Fujita Corporation, Takenaka Civil Engineering Corporation Ltd., and EEI Corporation.

Currently, there are more than 1.3 million commuters using our country's railway system (MRT 3, LRT 1, LRT 2, and the PNR). The Department of Transportation projects that the subway would be able to cater to 370,000 commuters by 2025, 669,000 commuters by 2030, and 973,000 customers by 2035.

Financing for the subway project
The Philippines is expected to finance such a big-ticket project through loans. The Philippines and Jica have already signed the first part of agreement amounting to P51 billion. The terms of this agreement includes a stipulated interest rate of 0.1% per annum for a period of 40 years with a maximum grace period of na additional 12 years.

Controversy surrounding the rerouting of the subway
Building such na expensive project has come with its controversies. Currently, the subway's budget is facing scrutiny because of allegations of its being overpriced.

Senate President Ralph Recto, who previously was the chair of the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA),  was against the supposed alteration of the route of the Metro Manila Subway. The budget of the subway was supposedly overstated by around P150 billion.

Originally, plans drawn up by Jica had the Metro Manila Subway Project running beneath Edsa right under the Metro Manila Railway Transit Line 3.

The MRT 3 spans 16.9 kilometers from North Avenue to Baclaran or Taft and has 260,000 commuters daily. Commuters have called using the MRT as the worst possible experience with people saying that when they come out of the MRT they become warriors because of its jam-packed capacity.

Instead of following the plan drawn up by Jica, the underground railway was rerouted. Instead of being under EDSA, the new route would go from North Ave then Tandang Sora then Katipunan Avenue before heading towards the commercial districts of Ortigas, Ayala, and Bonifacio Global City before reaching Pasay City.

This rerouting increased the project's initial estimated cost of P208 billion to P393 billion. It also made the subway pass through flood-zone areas and through a major earthquake fault. In light of this, senators are looking to probe into the project to see whether there was indeed overbloating of the project cost.

Benefits coming from the subway
Once fully operational, the subway is expected to service 370,000 commuters daily. This is expected to reduce the number of cars traversing EDSA as a more convenient mode of public transportation would encourage more people to commute instead of drive their cars.

The number of public vehicles such as bus, jeeps, and utility vehicles are also expected to decrease since some commuters would shift to taking the subway instead.

Commuters would also see a reduction in travel time. A trip from Quezon City to NAIA would be reduced to just 40 minutes from an original travel time of two hours.

Aside from EDSA, traffic is also expected to loosen in commercial business districts such as Ortigas, Ayala, BGC, and Pasay City. This is also expected to increase business activity as goods would be able to flow more easily in and out of these areas if there were less congestion.

Furthermore, prices of real estate properties are also seen to benefit from such a development. Areas in Pasay, Quezon City, BGC, Ortigas, and Ayala are set to reap the rewards of the construction. Increased accessibility brought about by the building of subway would mean an increase demand for residential, commercial, as well as office spaces within the vicinity of the subway stations. (READ: Investment Appeal of the Metro Manila Subway
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Overall, the subway is a nice step towards decongesting Metro Manila but with our population still continuing to grow, it is important for the Philippine government to keep up with this growth by increasing our road capacity and further improving our public transport system.