Concert, malfunctioning traffic lights to cause heavy traffic along Mandaue Reclamation Area on Nov. 30

Expect heavy traffic in the afternoon on Saturday, November 30, 2019 along Ouano Avenue at the Mandaue Reclamation Area because of the expected 400,000 people who will be expected to attend the Jesus Reigns celebration, which will be compounded by some of the city’s traffic lights in some major thoroughfares malfunctioning. | CDN FILE PHOTO

CEBU CITY, Philippines — Motorists are advised to avoid if possible passing along Ouano Avenue, F.F. Cruz Street, and E.O. Perez Street at the Mandaue Reclamation Area on Saturday as heavy traffic is expected along these areas because of the Jesus Reigns Concert and the malfunctioning of at least 60 traffic lights in the city.

Architect Florentino Nimor Jr., Traffic Enforcement Agency of Mandaue City (TEAM) executive director,  said that there would be no road closures for the half-day event surrounding the vacant F.F. Cruz lot, where an expected 400,000 people would gather for the religious concert, which would include a parade scheduled at 1 p.m.

But aside from the parade and the expected large crowd, which could contribute to the traffic in the area, another thing that would be expected to cause traffic in the area would be the 60 malfunctioning traffic lights.

He said a network outage caused the malfunction, these traffic lights along some of the city’s major thoroughfares would now have to be manually operated by TEAM personnel.

These included the intersection along U.N. Avenue and Highway Seno, since Thursday, November 28, 2019.

Although most of the traffic lights have been fixed, Nimoy said there might still be a possibility that they would have to go manual on Saturday, just to prevent any major traffic jams especially during the Jesus Reigns Concert. 

“Hangyoon lang namo ang mga tawo nga mosabot, amo naman gidali ang pag-ayo. Avoid tag agi dapit sa Parkmall usa,” said Nimor. 

(We are asking the public for understanding and we are trying our best to quickly fix the traffic lights. Just avoid passing along the area.)

He also said that they continued to fix the traffic lights which they expected to be up on the weekend either Saturday evening or Sunday evening.

The TEAM will be deploying at least 100 enforcers to ensure movement in the surrounding roads of the F.F. Cruz during the concert that will start at 1 p.m. and is expected to end at 6 p.m. 

Nimor is encouraging the motorists to take alternative routes if necessary to avoid the heavy traffic. /dbs