Trains to solve transport, traffic problems

Yes to mass transportation! No to more expressways, skyways and now skybridges!

I do not know why all administrations from the time of President Marcos to President Aquino have utterly ignored the train and other modes of mass transport to improve the ever-worsening traffic situation, especially in Metro Manila. In 2012, the Aquino administration gave only P54 million incentives to the Philippine National Railways (PNR).

Building more expressways, skyways and now skybridges (over esteros!) are very short term because vehicle volume fill up the added road space in five years, at best ten years! Moreover, cheap cars from China, Korea and India encourage all to own one since they have no alternative mode of transport. And more motor vehicles means more pollution.

So, I suggest that President Aquino and Congress allocate huge chunk of infrastructure budgets to the PNR so it could rehabilitate or build new railway tracks from Manila to Bicol, Manila to La Union, and Manila to Batangas Pier, hauling passengers and cargo at much less cost and no pollution.

With trains, people need not buy motor vehicles that pollute the air. More importantly, goods from the North, Bicol and Mindoro will be cheaper since freight would cost much less and there would be no more kotong cops to deal with.

GMA and CJ Corona are not the stumbling blocks in running this government. They are mere scapegoats for the Aquino administration’s non-performance. The real stumbling blocks are those in the driver seats in the Aquino administration who utterly lack vision and political will to make this country develop.

Six years is not too short for a visionary President. But it is long for a president who is at a loss on what’s before him. —EFREN H. MERCADO, Lipa City, Batangas