DOTR chief: Lining up at MRT stations down to minutes from an hour

The time spent lining up in the Metro Rail Transit (MRT)-3 stations has been reduced to at least seven minutes from what used to be 30 minutes to one hour, Transportation Secretary Vince Dizon said Friday..

“In North Avenue station, this is one of the most congested MRT-3 stations tuwing rush hour of 6 am to 9 am. Makikita po natin, napakalaking diperensiya ‘no. Dati po, umaabot ng halos isang oras ang pila diyan, minsan lampas pa ng isang oras. Pero dahil po sa mga ginawa natin base sa direktiba ng ating Pangulo, ngayon po ay minuto na lang po ang binibilang ng mga kababayan natin sa mga istasyon sa MRT,” Dizon said during a Palace press briefing..

(There has been a huge difference. People used to line up as long as an hour there, even longer than that. But because of the changes we made, people are now only counting minutes when lining up.)

Dizon said the deployment of additional MRT-3 trains and removal of x-ray machines while maintaining security with deployment of K9 dogs as well as personnel from the Philippine Coast Guard have made a difference.

“Can you imagine, the commuters are already able to save two hours of commuting time. That is a huge lift for our commuters and their families, and this makes them more productive at work,” he said.

Dizon said when he went to MRT-3 Taft Station three months ago, it took him 30 minutes to finally ride a train.

“Because of the interventions that have been done, I was only in line for five to seven minutes. Nagulat talaga ako eh (I was really surprised). So that really is the change we want for our people on a daily basis,” he said.

Dizon, however, clarified that the reduced queuing time in train stations is not enough.

“Tuloy-tuloy tayo dito, hindi tayo titigil, hindi tayo makukuntento dito sa nakikita ninyo ngayon. Kung puwede pa nating pabilisin iyan, kung puwede pa nating mawala na totally ang pilang iyan, iyon po ang gagawin natin,” Dizon added.

(We’ll keep at this. We won’t be content with what we have right now. If we can even make it better and remove the time spent for queuing, then that is what we are going to do.)  —AOL, GMA Integrated News