BAGUIO CITY — Due to the big volume of vehicles plying the city’s thoroughfares, city officials are left with no alternative but to look for other modes of transport in order to decongest the heavy vehicular traffic here.
To pursue this objective, the city council is reportedly about to give Mayor Bernardo Vergara the go-signal for him to sign a memorandum of agreement with a qualified proponent for the construction and operation of an electric bus-trolley system in the city’s business district.
The council’s committee on public utilities, traffic and transport chaired by Councilor Delfin Balajadia recommended the approval of a proposed resolution giving the mayor the authority to start negotiations on a build-operate-transfer scheme (BOT).
One condition is that the project will entail no cost to the city government.
The proposed resolution was authored by Councilors Elmer Datuin, Reinaldo Bautista Jr., Antonio Tabora Jr., Elmo Nevada, Federico Mandapat Jr., Nicasio Aliping Jr., Balajadia, Faustino Olowan and Rufino Panagan.
It cites the need to “extend and develop an alternative mass-based transport system to address the city’s worsening traffic problem.”
However, the transport system should be “in consonance with sound engineering standards as well as environmentally protective regulations, which would be socially acceptable to the stakeholders and which is predetermined to be economically advantageous to the city.”
The idea of venturing into trolley system came up during the Traffic Summit conducted by the City Planning Office last Dec. 12.
The city council, in approving Resolution No. 17-2004 authored by Councilors Rufino Panagan and Leonardo Bayan Jr., authorizes the mayor’s office to commission a separate agency to conduct a feasibility study to determine the viability of the proposed project.
