Especially for metropolitan areas like Cebu, solving traffic woes should be central to the platforms of governance of candidates for election in May 2019.
As we learned earlier this year, the country loses P3.5 billion daily to traffic congestion in Metro Manila alone.
The losses are clearly higher when costs in other metros across the country are counted.
The Cebu City government plans to pilot test a smart traffic management system that will make apprehension of violators more efficient with the use of advanced programs and closed-circuit television cameras.
The plan is likewise expected to dissuade persons from committing crimes as it banks on the deterrent effect of known surveillance.
Businessmen have lauded the plan and anticipate the full implementation of the “intelligent” system that is perceived to be long overdue.
If candidates for public office elsewhere in Cebu, whether Minglanilla town in the south or Liloan town in the north sincerely feel for the suffering of constituents in traffic jams, they, too, will integrate the upgrade of their own traffic management systems into their platforms.
The local leaders also must put their heads together to comply with reasonable measures like the tricycle-clearing of national roads ordered by the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG).
To let Cebu City alone lead in traffic technology while neighboring locales wallow in street congestion or while doing nothing about the DILG order — a good first step to unclogging roads — would be self-defeating considering the necessity of integrated traffic in any metro.
Creative proposals of dealing with traffic should even be sought among contenders for Senate and Lower House seats. Do they support the bill to legalize telecommuting among our workforce?
A lack of commitment to solving our traffic woes among political aspirants is a sure sign of their elitist disconnection from the masses, of minds cushioned from the stress of the thoroughfare by drivers in their employ or by their convenient capability to dissolve roadblocks by wielding their powerful vehicle plates (or deploying their security details to deal with snarls).
Vote for leaders who will deliver progress on the road for the common good.