PNR extends operations, offers special coaches to ease NCR traffic

Starting next month, the Philippine National Railways (PNR) will extend operating hours and deploy a special coach service to ease traffic congestion in Metro Manila roads. 

 

“This is one of the DOTC’s first efforts towards easing the present traffic situation in Manila, Makati, Pasay, and other affected areas especially in the southern part of the metropolis,” Michael Arthur Sagcal, spokesperson of the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC), said in a statement Wednesday. 

 

PNR will extend operating hours to 4 a.m. to 8 p.m. instead of 5 a.m. to 7 p.m.

 

The train service takes 1 hour and 15 minutes to the Buendia station in Makati City from the Sta. Rosa station in Laguna and 31 minutes from Tutuban station to the Buendia station.

 

In the same statement, PNR general manager Joseph Allan Dilay said they would also launch a special coach service on March 3. 

 

Special coach fares range from P60 to P90. The service uses air-conditioned train sets that could accommodate 120 passengers per. It has fixed seating, on-board comfort rooms, reclining seats, and a lounge section. 

 

The service would run four times per day leaving Tutuban station to Sta. Rosa at 5:45 a.m. and the last trip arriving at the Tutuban station from Sta. Rosa at 7:54 p.m.

 

Depending on ridership turnout, Dilay said PNR would evaluate to increase the number of trips further in order to serve more passengers. 

 

Residents of Metro Manila have been facing heavy traffic after big-ticket road network projects like Skyway Stage 3 and NAIA Expressway Phase 2 started construction this week. 

These are first and second of a series of 15 road and infrastructure projects in the metropolis over a span of two years. — SOA/RSJ, GMA News