I like Bayani Fernando’s pink fences

Bayani Fernando’s pink fences are not very aesthetic but they serve their purpose, and that’s to instill discipline in our major roads in Metro Manila. Some people want those fences removed and I’ll bet these are the same people who are against Bayani’s other traffic improvement scheme: the wet rag. Maybe I am turning fascist in my old age, but as a harassed driver, I think we can use some forced discipline out there. I’ll admit that these two schemes look pretty desperate but that’s only because the situation in our streets is pretty desperate.

The pink fences and the wet rag are desperate measures to force some amount of discipline on unruly drivers and pedestrians to behave and keep to their side of the road so that traffic would flow somewhat more smoothly. In the case of the pink fences, we most certainly need these physical barriers for the simple reason that nothing less works in this town.

The concept is not new. When I was a young reporter just out of college, I was assigned to cover Manila City Hall when Antonio Villegas was mayor. Mayor Villegas was one colorful leader with ideas as unconventional then as Bayani Fernando’s ideas are now. One big issue at that time was the concrete flower boxes that Mayor Villegas constructed along the center islands of major streets like Taft Avenue, Quezon Boulevard and España.

I remember the City Council, which was composed of petty politicians, was up in arms. The Clowncilors complained that the flower boxes were unsightly and wasted the people’s money. There were some who claimed the boxes were traffic hazards. On the contrary, Mayor Villegas declared. Hizzoner the Mayor defended the flower boxes as necessary to prevent jaywalkers from crossing just anywhere, slowing down traffic and causing accidents.

I thought the Mayor was right. Except that the Mayor underestimated the determination of the Pinoy pedestrians to violate the law and be a nuisance to drivers and the cause of free flowing traffic. They were exposing their lives to even more serious danger of being run over by speeding jeepneys, inasmuch as not all of them are athletic enough to jump high enough to go over the flower boxes.

So Mayor Villegas ordered the flower boxes built higher. I don’t remember now if a court finally ordered the Mayor to stop but the effort didn’t go beyond the major streets. Who knows...we could have built Olympic champions out of our high jumping pedestrians if the Mayor was allowed to build more of those concrete flower boxes.

In fact, I am sure many of our pedestrians could have been Olympic medallists also in sports that test muscle strength like weightlifting. Long after Mayor Villegas died in the United States, I remember seeing steel island barriers in EDSA near Guadalupe that have been forced open as if a thousand pound gorilla did it. Like the concrete flower boxes, the steel island barriers were meant to keep pedestrians from jaywalking but somehow they forced the barriers open to frustrate that objective.

Now comes Bayani Fernando with a variation of the same solution. Hopefully, what failed with pedestrians will now work with buses. EDSA bus drivers are probably the world’s most undisciplined and no amount of yellow lines or strict police monitoring could keep them in their place. Hence, the pink fences of Bayani had to come up. Those fences are unsightly but what’s the alternative? More anarchy and longer commute times?

Actually, Pinoy drivers, public utility or private motorist, have this built in mental difficulty of staying in lane. Everyone is shifting lanes all the time, not realizing and not caring that they slow down traffic in the process. It is every man or woman for oneself out there on EDSA and elsewhere in Metro Manila. That’s the kind of mentality Bayani Fernando and his traffic law enforcers must deal with everyday. And when nothing seems to work other than physical barriers, there is just no choice. MMDA officials must just make sure those pink fences aren’t too flimsy and do not occupy too much road space.

My only question for Bayani Fernando is, do you have to paint those fences pink?

Peak oil

World oil prices are pushing fast towards the $60 a barrel level. That’s bad news for the world economy. High oil prices work like taxes in putting the brakes on the growth of the economy. Money that consumers could have used to buy more goods and services go to pay for oil instead.

OPEC tried to calm the markets by ordering an increase in production quotas but failed due to concerns about the oil cartel’s limited ability to quickly add more barrels to the market. The market brushed off the OPEC decision, knowing that since OPEC members are already producing above their quotas, no extra supply will actually be added.

Analysts say world oil prices are on the upswing because demand projection had been understated. There is a strong undercurrent of demand, specially from China, that had not been accounted for. Yet, the pricing for oil in the international market is also largely driven by psychology. There is the fear factor from terrorism that adds more than a dollar or two to oil’s per barrel cost. There is also the fear that the world has just about reached its maximum possible output... that we are now living in the age of peak oil.

The concept of peak oil is something everyone must understand. It means we are no longer discovering and putting into production more oil deposits than we require. For the most part, the biggest fields have been discovered worldwide. What remains is technologically prohibitive (water depth, downhole temperature or sheer depth of the deposit). We are at our peak. That means, it is downhill in terms of available supply from now on.

Yet, demand from new emerging economies like China may rise significantly in the coming years. Strong demand and declining supply can only mean higher prices. We must realize we do not have a God-given right to cheap oil when there is less of it available.

That should make alternative energy economically viable. But we are also forgetting that the era of peak oil also means we need to conserve whatever we now have, because worse than high prices is the inevitability of shortages. We have to learn to use what we have more efficiently. Conservation, if taken to heart, is like discovering a large commercial oil field.

Still, I think the oil companies seem to be taking advantage of the situation. I think we deserve a good explanation from Shell and Petron why they seem to be keeping pace with the small players in raising prices. The two majors are local refiners so that there should be some lag time before they reflect the price increases that the smaller players have no choice but to quickly impose, because they only buy finished products from the spot market.

I would think that Shell, for one, would be more careful in abusing its pricing power under our deregulation law. That’s because of a recent experience in Argentina that could happen here too. According to The Economist, when Shell raised fuel prices by up to 4.2 percent, Argentina’s President Nestor Kirchner called for a boycott of its petrol stations, causing the Anglo-Dutch oil company’s sales to drop by 70 percent.

The oil majors should restrain themselves from behaving like a cartel. I’d hate to see the demise of our deregulation law simply because it seems to have effectively divorced oil pricing from politics. The oil majors should know a good thing they have now and go out of their way to behave themselves.

Spam joke

It takes me at least 15 minutes each morning cleaning my mailbox of spam. But once in a while, there’s something useful in all that garbage... like a good joke. Here’s one.

Due to a minor glitch in the celestial time-space continuum, Albert Einstein, Pablo Picasso and George W. Bush all arrived at the Pearly Gates simultaneously. Saint Peter said, "You look like three famous people, but you have no idea the length people will go to sneak into Heaven. You must prove who you are."

Einstein requests a blackboard and chalk, then covers it many times over with arcane mathematics describing his special theory of relativity. Saint Peter is impressed. "You really are Einstein! Welcome to heaven!"

Then Saint Peter turns to Picasso. "Give me that chalk," says Picasso. With a few deft strokes he creates a stunning array of bulls, satyrs and nude women. Saint Peter applauds. "You really are Picasso! Welcome to heaven!"

Saint Peter then turns to George W. Bush. "Einstein and Picasso have proved their identity. How can you prove yours?"

Dubya looks bewildered. "Who’s Einstein and Picasso?"

Saint Peter sighs, "Come on in, George."

Boo Chanco’s e-mail address is [email protected]