The traffic light along S. Osmeña Road is one of the many traffic lights in Cebu City. CDN Digital photo | Gerard Vincent Francisco
CEBU CITY, Philippines–Cebu City Mayor Edgardo Labella could not wait for the annual budget in 2020 to fix the traffic system in Cebu City.
This is why Labella has requested half of the P500 million asked by the Cebu City Transportation Office (CCTO) to overhaul its digital traffic system from the mid-year supplemental budget of the city.
Read: CCTO needs P500 million for traffic digital system overhaul
“P250 million is already in the supplemental budget, but I still have to review unsay sulod ani (what’s in it),” said Labella. “But this should make the upgrade faster.”
This supplemental budget is subject to the approval of Cebu City Council before it can be released to the CCTO.
Labella said he will be reviewing the allocation of the budget, especially on the priority expenses on the overhaul of the traffic system, whether the upgrade should begin with the faulty traffic lights or the upgrade of the analog traffic system to a digital traffic system.
The digital traffic system consists of the digital board, traffic light communication system, traffic lights, and control system.
Labella mentioned he wants a new digital traffic system that would be at par with that of Mandaue City and Talisay City as he noticed that Cebu City’s system, which used to be advanced 30 years ago, has been outdated in comparison with the two neighboring cities.
Labella hopes that with a better traffic system, the city’s traffic congestion problems would be minimized as the city government awaits for the long-term solution such as the Bus Rapid Transport System (BRT) and the monorail.
The need to upgrade was highlighted following the malfunction of 20 traffic lights on August 14, 2019.
Read: Cebu City hit by horrendous traffic jam caused by malfunctioning SCATS
In previous statements, the CCTO said they have proposed to upgrade the Sydney Coordinated Adaptive Traffic System (Scats) from its current analog version to a digital version.
The CCTO also said the P500 million already includes the purchase of new traffic lights to replace all the broken and malfunctioning traffic lights in the city.
Read: Cebu City traffic lights fixed but congestion remains
Cebu City has over a hundred traffic lights for its 78 lighted junctions. /bmjo