Bus rapid transit projects to proceed after site inspections —DOtr

The bus rapid transit projects in Metro Manila and Cebu will soon proceed months after the Department of Transportation decided against their implementation due to physical and infrastructure limitations, a DOTr official said on Wednesday.

Assistant Secretary for Road Transport and Infrastructure Mark De Leon said an inspection of the proposed sites of the BTR projects by the DOTr, the National Economic Development Authority and the World Bank prompted the change.

"Basically nagkaroon kami ng inspection with the World Bank team, and also joined by NEDA and in-evaluate natin iyong conditions ng corridor ng Cebu and also Quezon Avenue," De Leon said at a news conference in Malacañang.

"And we found out na posibleng mag-run pa iyong BRT in these corridors," he added.

De Leon said the DOTr had already hired a technical support consultant for the Cebu BRT.

He added that the Department of Finance had also been informed of the DOTr's decision to go ahead with the BRT project in Metro Manila.

De Leon said the DOTr would proceed with the detailed engineering design for the Metro Manila BRT this year.

The BRT system is a specialized form of mass transportation where modern buses will ply exclusive lanes and will use specific stations.

Among the BRT projects in the pipeline are the 12.3-kilometer line that will run from Manila City Hall to Quezon Memorial Circle via Quezon Avenue to be composed of 16 bus stations and the 48.6-kilometer line that will run the stretch of EDSA, Ayala Avenue, Ortigas Avenue, Bonifacio Global City in Taguig and the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) to be composed of 63 stations.

The Cebu BRT project, meanwhile, will have 33 bus stations expected to service hundreds of thousands of passengers daily. 

At a House inquiry in June, Transportation Assistant Secretary Arturo Fabillar said that the BRT project — seen as among the solutions to Metro Manila's perennial traffic problem — was withdrawn for "further studies."

Fabillar said there are also proposals to build a new railway.

He added that they would submit to NEDA a new study once they have considered the possibility of constructing a new railway.

But Quezon City Representative Winston Castelo, chairman of the House committee on Metro Manila development, said that the BRT project has already been funded under the 2018 national budget. —NB, GMA News