The J Spotter

Now I've encountered complaints about MMDA's resorting to making U-turns the norm in an attempt to improve Metro Manila's traffic situation (read old but insightful articles here and here -- links will open in new windows; ctrl-click in Firefox to open in a new tab), but this is plain silly. Imagine putting to waste an interchange that had cost millions in taxpayers' money, and instead replacing it with a scheme that gives U-turning vehicles the right-of-way or priority over straight-through traffic.

Traffic lights and interchanges were invented for the very reason of allowing for better traffic management. If traffic situation in the Commonwealth-Tandang Sora intersection were to improve with this scheme, then Chairman Fernando deserves an inventor of the decade award!

I'm a fan of innovative thinking, considering myself to be an innovative person as well. And it can be argued that MMDA's preference for a U-turn scheme has indeed brought about marked improvements in the traffic situation in some areas. But unless MMDA had been able to conclude a through study on the advantages of shifting to a U-turn scheme in this particular intersection/interchange, and unless the flyover has already passed its economic life, then it would be tantamount to going against what is supposedly an out-of-the-box thinking, since they may as well generalize that since the U-turns worked elsewhere then it should also work here.

And what will MMDA do with the abandoned flyover? Plant trees on it? (They had uprooted quite a number of trees over the past in their re-design/re-configuration of major thoroughfares in favor of U-turn slots.)

I hope Chairman BF just spoke about this as a joke.

** Image courtesy of Philstar.com

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 28, 2004 at 02:35. There are . Post a Comment if you have something interesting to say. Read the J Spot for Angelo's writings on tech stuff.