The gullible me got caught more than a year ago for some arguable traffic violation. I got caught turning right on the second lane of the North-bound EDSA to Shaw Blvd. It was 8am in a Sunday morning and traffic is light except for the buses that prevented me from turning using the rightmost lane. As soon as I turned using the second turning lane, I got flagged and told that I swerved. It was a reckless violation that costs 500php. (Wait a minute. Why do we have a two-lane-wide right turn provision from EDSA to Shaw when you can't turn on the 2nd lane???)
I asked for a ticket, and the MMDA guy gave me one. He also asked me to pay for the ticket so that he can give back my license already. And so I thought I was doing well. Since I got the ticket receipt, I thought it was OK.
When I got back home, however, I inspected my first ever ticket in my life and saw that only 200php was written on it. Hmmm, I have some complaining to do. I checked on MMDA to find out that I have no pending dues. That, I thought meant the traffic enforcer remitted my payment fine. But still he must have pocketed 300php of it.
I went to the MMDA headquarters to file my complaints. I thought I would do my country proud to try to do the right thing. A few minutes there however dampened my desire to do just that. It rained hard, and I don't have any idea how to proceed and the people there just seem so unhelpful. Traffic adjudication takes too long that it's difficult to justify it with my precious time.
So I went home empty-handed, willing to forget about the traffic enforcer, curse him, and say goodbye to my traffic ticket and give up any hopes for MMDA.
~~~
Until... I tried renewing my license four days ago. I found out I was on the alarm list. The only possibility was that the cursed traffic enforcer didn't remit the payment after all. I was wrong. He didn't pocket 300php of it. He pocketed everything, and gave me a ticket to boot (which was my fault, because I asked for it, wanting to do the right thing, and got kicked twice instead).
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Beating the Red Light
You're coming up to an intersection. Traffic light is green. BUT unfortunately the other side is full, cars on a standstill. Do you still cross the intersection, knowing there's a big chance you're going to be obstructing the intersecting road once their traffic signal goes green?
I've seen this case too often enough and it's one major cause of heavy traffic in Metro Manila. Perhaps MMDA should just redefine "Beating the Red Light" to "Getting Caught by the Red Light". Then, no matter if it's green or orange. As long as the Red Light catches you blocking the intersection, you've earned your ticket.
That will do good on MMDA's revenue collection. At least until people learn a bit of discipline, and everyone can enjoy a bit less stressful road traffic.
I've seen this case too often enough and it's one major cause of heavy traffic in Metro Manila. Perhaps MMDA should just redefine "Beating the Red Light" to "Getting Caught by the Red Light". Then, no matter if it's green or orange. As long as the Red Light catches you blocking the intersection, you've earned your ticket.
That will do good on MMDA's revenue collection. At least until people learn a bit of discipline, and everyone can enjoy a bit less stressful road traffic.
Monday, October 11, 2010
Clogging the Intersections
Why does it seem that the most common traffic problem I encounter the clogged out intersections? We have those yellow signs on the intersections that says "no blocking" the all important crossings everywhere. And if we've learned to drive properly, I mean not just skills but also driving etiquette, we shouldn't even need those on the roads.
I would think MMDA/traffic enforcers can reach their much maligned quotas better by just enforcing the no-blocking-the-intersection rule. If there's such a rule, that is. If there's none, than they should introduce it as fast as they can. If they do just that, maybe traffic in the Philippines will be much better.
Now what do I mean exactly by this rule? Well, we know the green light means go. What the rule would do is that if you see a green light but you're not sure if you do proceed that you'll be blocking the intersection, then you'll just simply have to wait and see. We need to exercise our brains more while driving anyway.
Why do we need this rule? The time you saved by blocking the intersection but getting an early pass is amplified into time waiting for a lot more cars. Driving is a social exercise. Treat each egregious apathy to other drivers as a personal insult.
I would think MMDA/traffic enforcers can reach their much maligned quotas better by just enforcing the no-blocking-the-intersection rule. If there's such a rule, that is. If there's none, than they should introduce it as fast as they can. If they do just that, maybe traffic in the Philippines will be much better.
Now what do I mean exactly by this rule? Well, we know the green light means go. What the rule would do is that if you see a green light but you're not sure if you do proceed that you'll be blocking the intersection, then you'll just simply have to wait and see. We need to exercise our brains more while driving anyway.
Why do we need this rule? The time you saved by blocking the intersection but getting an early pass is amplified into time waiting for a lot more cars. Driving is a social exercise. Treat each egregious apathy to other drivers as a personal insult.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Araneta Ave, Crossing Aurora to N. Dominga
If you're traveling along Araneta Ave going towards N. Domingo, the street becomes a five-lane wide street by the time you reach the Aurora Ave. traffic light. The two leftmost lanes are supposed to be for cars taking a left turn to Aurora. The next two lanes will be for those going ahead to N. Domingo. The last lane is for the right-turners, those going to Sta. Mesa and beyond.
That is a very logical and wise setup, as Aurora Ave is just 3-lane wide at its mouth, Araneta will become also a 3-lane street upon crossing Aurora, and we want to free up the right most lane so as not to unnecessarily trouble the right turners. Two lanes for each 3-lane seems optimal so as to allow right-turners or stopped public utility vehicles entrance to the 3rd lanes. For example, cars on the right most lane of Ramon Magsaysay Ave can and will occupy the 3rd lane of Araneta once they take a right turn. In line with this, we avoid creating a merging point on the rightmost lane of Araneta by having only two lanes cross Aurora.
Unfortunately this otherwise optimal lane division which would promise speedy smoothness rarely happens. There are fewer cars taking a left turn to Aurora from Araneta. The five lanes at times becomes left, straight, straight, straight, straight. The right turners are blocked from their convenient escape from Araneta. And we will now have four lanes from Araneta and one lane from Ramon Magsaysay going towards a 3 lane street. It doesn't take serious math to know 5 streams of vehicles going to a 3 lane street is serious choking point. That there's SM Centerpoint with an entrance right by the corner does not help. And so do the lazy and uncaring people who are ignoring the overhead pedestrian bridge and crossing the street against the road traffic.
When I do go through this route, I will almost always be on the 3rd lane. What I do to somewhat make things a little better for me and the cars behind is to be positioned as left as possible but still on my lane. The idea is to make it look really difficult to merge from the 2nd lane to Araneta. If it works, my lane would be the best lane to be. At least I tried.
That is a very logical and wise setup, as Aurora Ave is just 3-lane wide at its mouth, Araneta will become also a 3-lane street upon crossing Aurora, and we want to free up the right most lane so as not to unnecessarily trouble the right turners. Two lanes for each 3-lane seems optimal so as to allow right-turners or stopped public utility vehicles entrance to the 3rd lanes. For example, cars on the right most lane of Ramon Magsaysay Ave can and will occupy the 3rd lane of Araneta once they take a right turn. In line with this, we avoid creating a merging point on the rightmost lane of Araneta by having only two lanes cross Aurora.
Unfortunately this otherwise optimal lane division which would promise speedy smoothness rarely happens. There are fewer cars taking a left turn to Aurora from Araneta. The five lanes at times becomes left, straight, straight, straight, straight. The right turners are blocked from their convenient escape from Araneta. And we will now have four lanes from Araneta and one lane from Ramon Magsaysay going towards a 3 lane street. It doesn't take serious math to know 5 streams of vehicles going to a 3 lane street is serious choking point. That there's SM Centerpoint with an entrance right by the corner does not help. And so do the lazy and uncaring people who are ignoring the overhead pedestrian bridge and crossing the street against the road traffic.
When I do go through this route, I will almost always be on the 3rd lane. What I do to somewhat make things a little better for me and the cars behind is to be positioned as left as possible but still on my lane. The idea is to make it look really difficult to merge from the 2nd lane to Araneta. If it works, my lane would be the best lane to be. At least I tried.
Saturday, July 3, 2010
No Si, Anti-Smoking Commuting
It used to be almost everyday that I commute to go to school, then work, and other places. I averaged 2 legs of jeepneys and buses and I almost never rode FX or taxi because I strangely felt they're less safe. One of the biggest annoyance I had with commuting then was the smoke -- not the carbon monoxide exhaust of inefficient jeeps and buses (which is terrible, but unavoidable) but the 2nd hand smoke I got to breathe from passenger and driver smokers.
Smoking was bad enough in bars and restaurants and other places, but there I always had the freedom to walk away and escape (which I almost always exercised), but in jeeps, having had to go down the jeep the moment the driver or a passenger lighted a cigarette in the middle of a ride was prohibitively expensive and impractical. I had little way of protesting except to get as far away from bad-smelling breaths and carcinogens and cover my nose and mouth with my sleeves -- I almost never brought handkerchiefs -- to show my silent annoyances.
What I did then was before I got on a ride, I checked if the driver was smoking or not. I would not ride a jeepney whose driver I knew beforehand as a smoker. There was a time I even tried taking down on my notebook the plate numbers I'd found to be "offenders". Nevertheless, this didn't really pan out well. Drivers often started the smoking session well into the ride. I'd given up on much and just went back to covering myself with little defense my shirt afforded.
So it was much a welcome surprise to me that there seemed to be fairly recent changes regarding this annoyance of mine. I wouldn't know how recent as I rarely heard news about what our estranged government had been doing. No Si - a play on Yosi, which itself is a play on Si-garil-yo. Actually I wasn't sure even if I heard things right. No more smoking on public transportation including jeeps and taxis? Is it too good to be true? Well, with how much jeepneys get away with so much, it feels indeed too good to be expected. But still, it's a welcome start.
Smoking was bad enough in bars and restaurants and other places, but there I always had the freedom to walk away and escape (which I almost always exercised), but in jeeps, having had to go down the jeep the moment the driver or a passenger lighted a cigarette in the middle of a ride was prohibitively expensive and impractical. I had little way of protesting except to get as far away from bad-smelling breaths and carcinogens and cover my nose and mouth with my sleeves -- I almost never brought handkerchiefs -- to show my silent annoyances.
What I did then was before I got on a ride, I checked if the driver was smoking or not. I would not ride a jeepney whose driver I knew beforehand as a smoker. There was a time I even tried taking down on my notebook the plate numbers I'd found to be "offenders". Nevertheless, this didn't really pan out well. Drivers often started the smoking session well into the ride. I'd given up on much and just went back to covering myself with little defense my shirt afforded.
So it was much a welcome surprise to me that there seemed to be fairly recent changes regarding this annoyance of mine. I wouldn't know how recent as I rarely heard news about what our estranged government had been doing. No Si - a play on Yosi, which itself is a play on Si-garil-yo. Actually I wasn't sure even if I heard things right. No more smoking on public transportation including jeeps and taxis? Is it too good to be true? Well, with how much jeepneys get away with so much, it feels indeed too good to be expected. But still, it's a welcome start.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
What the Election Season Means to Traffic
Roads. Destroying perfectly good roads. Putting asphalt on perfectly good cemented roads. Lots of road construction. Lots of government spending. But for what?
It's a country tradition. Election in the Philippines comes after road construction.
Right across our store, they're putting asphalt on our nice road. It was supposedly cement, but the congressman's pork barrel was said to have lacked funds to complete their re-cementing of our cemented road. So now, we have a long street in various stages of construction, our segment of which is in asphalt and a couple of inches higher than the rest of the street. The rest of the street had been re-cemented already, during the past few weeks. I wouldn't say they repaired anything, at least in our segment of the road. It's just, well, re-cementing. Only now, cement can also stand for asphalt.
Now why are they doing this? They could have used the money for better things than this grand misuse of taxes. Some say this is just an act to appease auditors come the next months or years, to say that they were using pork barrel for construction, even though this particular case has no benefit to the people. Some further say that with every constructions such as this, there's another construction of a nice private house or something out of sight. Given that, it's no surprise we don't have enough funds. When we're constructing more than what we are budgeting for, we're bound to get problems. Especially if its the overpriced roads we love to hate, and feeling helpless about it.
It's a country tradition. Election in the Philippines comes after road construction.
Right across our store, they're putting asphalt on our nice road. It was supposedly cement, but the congressman's pork barrel was said to have lacked funds to complete their re-cementing of our cemented road. So now, we have a long street in various stages of construction, our segment of which is in asphalt and a couple of inches higher than the rest of the street. The rest of the street had been re-cemented already, during the past few weeks. I wouldn't say they repaired anything, at least in our segment of the road. It's just, well, re-cementing. Only now, cement can also stand for asphalt.
Now why are they doing this? They could have used the money for better things than this grand misuse of taxes. Some say this is just an act to appease auditors come the next months or years, to say that they were using pork barrel for construction, even though this particular case has no benefit to the people. Some further say that with every constructions such as this, there's another construction of a nice private house or something out of sight. Given that, it's no surprise we don't have enough funds. When we're constructing more than what we are budgeting for, we're bound to get problems. Especially if its the overpriced roads we love to hate, and feeling helpless about it.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Araneta corner N. Domingo, San Juan
Here's a major choke point. I've wondered why no one cares to fix this; perhaps it's more complicated than it looks to me.
What happens is we have a four lane south bound Araneta avenue going into a two lane street on either left or right. Vehicles going to the right aren't the problem. What is really the issue here is that the four lane avenue, despite proper lane markers and left-turn/right-turn signs, is transformed into five lanes going to the left, and one lane going to the right.
It doesn't take a genius to simulate what that ensues. Five lanes all turning into two lanes is a lot of merging. What gives?
Perhaps MMDA can make physical barriers to reduce the converging lanes. Or perhaps they should take lane division as a traffic offence. Seriously.
What happens is we have a four lane south bound Araneta avenue going into a two lane street on either left or right. Vehicles going to the right aren't the problem. What is really the issue here is that the four lane avenue, despite proper lane markers and left-turn/right-turn signs, is transformed into five lanes going to the left, and one lane going to the right.
It doesn't take a genius to simulate what that ensues. Five lanes all turning into two lanes is a lot of merging. What gives?
Perhaps MMDA can make physical barriers to reduce the converging lanes. Or perhaps they should take lane division as a traffic offence. Seriously.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Quezon Ave. D. Tuazon U-Turn Swerves
MMDA's Quezon Ave. U-turn slot implementation has been successful in increasing traffic throughput and average speed. Unfortunately, some drivers have come to abuse it, swerving from streets too close to the slots, or even doing counter flow shortcuts to get to the u-turn slots.
At the Quezon Ave. / D. Tuazon U-turn slot, a lot of cars and trucks routinely go out through Speaker Perez to do a U-turn in Q. Ave. While this is fine and dandy to those who go through this route, it seems to me a selfish manuever that causes much slowdown to the traffic plying Quezon Ave towards Espana...
Perhaps, MMDA should set guidelines as to what is considered swerving, perhaps paint lines to indicate allowable usage of the U-turn slots.
At the Quezon Ave. / D. Tuazon U-turn slot, a lot of cars and trucks routinely go out through Speaker Perez to do a U-turn in Q. Ave. While this is fine and dandy to those who go through this route, it seems to me a selfish manuever that causes much slowdown to the traffic plying Quezon Ave towards Espana...
Perhaps, MMDA should set guidelines as to what is considered swerving, perhaps paint lines to indicate allowable usage of the U-turn slots.
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