MRTC to blame for overcrowded trains, MRT3 general manager says

Metro Rail Transit Corp., the private consortium that runs the MRT Line 3 (MRT3) alongside the Transportation department, is to blame for overcrowding on the trains that run on EDSA, the general manager of MRT3 said.

 

MRT 3 general manager Al Vitangcol III said in an interview with reporters that the only solution to the overcapacity at the MRT3 is to procure brand new trains, which a court order bars the Department of Transportation and Communications from doing.

 

“The government has been doing its best to help the public. We are at that point wherein we will give the go signal for the manufacturing of the train, then one entity will stop us. The riders should blame MRTC,” Vitangcol said.

 

DOTC has already issued a Notice of Award for the P3.8 billion MRT3 capacity expansion project involving the acquisition of 48 new trains to Dalian Locomotive and Rolling Stock Co. Ltd of China.  A Temporary Order of Protection issued by Makati Regional Trial Court Branch 66 is keeping the DOTC from implementing the project, however.

 

"They stopped us for 20 days, meaning the delivery would be delayed for 20 days," he said.

In the meantime, he said, the foregone sales amount to P9.41 million while savings from maintenance costs amount to P564,147.73 because of the delay.

 

But former MRTC chairman Robert Sobrepeña said the firm has the right to supply the trains under an existing build-lease-transfer (BLT) agreement signed in 1999 amid the request of the DOTC then to acquire second-hand instead of new trains.

 

"We offered brand-new trains for expansion. That offer is still pending but the reply of the DOTC was to supply second-hand trains," Sobrepeña said. He said offers were made in 2000, 2004, and 2008.

 

MRTC has already filed an arbitration case against the DOTC at the International Chamber of Commerce - Court of Arbitration in Singapore for violating the BLT agreement which will only expire in 2025. — JDS, GMA News