For whatever reason, the authorities have started the EDSA Rehabilitation Program in the thick of the holiday season. I guess they want a head start so by 2026, people and LGUs are already used to the traffic and side streets they have to take. The scope of the program includes the repair of road, drainages, and improvement of sidewalks – no additional lanes. So there’s really no light at the end of this program for motorists plying the road. We’ll go back to the same dense EDSA we are already familiar with.
I’ve had my eras with different sections of EDSA. Some are putting the blame on the different number of lanes per section of the highway, and of course the massive amount of cars on the road. However, I believe things can be tolerable if everyone just stops being selfish. Filipinos are often said to be jolly, hospitable, but on the road we are very greedy and we only think about ourselves.
This trait is most apparent on the hot spots of EDSA which are the merging points. There’s the underpass of Cubao and Shaw, the flyover of Santolan, Ortigas junction, and Ayala tunnel to name a few. In all of these points, the traffic stems from drivers scrambling to be ahead of each other. Others will not queue in line and will use a lane of the service road, before forcing a merge at the last few meters before a flyover.
Traffic could still be avoided if we just implement a normal zipper-lane merge. Actually, traffic can be eased a lot if we’re just courteous and implement zipper merge. But as I said, we only think about ourselves. Those already in the flyover lanes won’t give an inch to those coming from the service road. This is the same mentality they have when someone tries to switch lanes. They won’t allow it, as if a single car will give them an additional 30 minutes of travel time.
Others are so brazen in reverse too. If they’re in the flyover lane and they need to be on the service road, they’ll block traffic instead of just sucking it up and making a detour somewhere else.
Things are worse on local, undivided roads. Motorcycles and cars tend to counterflow if they see their direction not moving an inch. They also brazenly block intersections even though they see the road in front is not moving, all because the stoplight is still green. Common sense will say we should stop since the other drivers won’t be able to cross if we block the yellow square. Then again, common sense ain’t so common on the road. This is why there was horrendous traffic in Pasig-Antipolo last month.
If you think that’s bad enough, wait until you get stuck in traffic in provincial municipalities. Even if there’s a road divider, they will use U-Turn slots to gain entry to the opposing lane while others will use the right shoulder. I experienced having to go to the dirt path beyond the shoulder because the opposing lane that’s experiencing a grid-lock already occupied our 2 lanes and even the shoulder.
Even the highway is not spared. Sometimes it’s the trucks overtaking each other because one of them has a heavy load and therefore cannot move faster than 60kph. Some cars also run at the minimum on the second lane, since the third lane is always dilapidated from all the trucks running on it. And of course, there’s the traffic caused by cars not moving away from the overtaking lane even though they’re nowhere near the speed limit. Again, it’s not up to you to impose the speed limit. Move someone is faster than you.
It will be a long time before the public transportation in the city, and inter-city, can catch up to the actual demands of the commuting public. With the onslaught of Chinese cars, the number of new cars will undoubtedly only increase. The best solution we have right now in order to ease traffic flow in all roads is to change the mindset of everyone using it – stop being selfish and think of others too.
