Bike lanes are put up along a section of S.B Cabahug Street in Barangay Ibabao-Estancia, Mandaue City on Tuesday afternoon, June 9, 2020. CDN Digital photo | Brian J. Ochoa
CEBU CITY, Philippines— As Mandaue City started putting up bike lanes in key areas in the city, bikers from this highly urbanized city couldn’t be happier with this development.
One of them is Jeffry Silvano, a resident from Maguikay, Mandaue City, and a cycling enthusiast.
Silvano, 33, is a factory worker and a cyclist since 2017. He tells CDN Digital that seeing bike lanes in Mandaue City is really a huge sigh of relief for people like him, who bike their way to work every day.
“It is very convenient to bikers, especially to people who bike to work because it helps in avoiding accidents, especially to newbie bikers who are not familiar with biking on the road,” said Silvano.
Silvano lives in Maguikay and travels to Basak, Lapu-Lapu every day using his mountain bike. With the bike lanes available, his usual 20-minute bike to work is now cut short by 10 minutes.
Read: Mandaue will finalize bike lane plans within the week
He says with the help of the bike lanes around the city, Silvano is now more confident to bike to work.
But Silvano is also reminding cyclists and motorists that the 1.2-meter wide bike lanes will be useless if they don’t respect and honor them.
“With the bike lanes I suggest that everyone should be aware and learn how to share the road by putting on signs/boards for vehicles to see,” he added.
Lawyer Jamaal James Calipayan, the executive director of the Traffic Enforcement Agency of Mandaue, has already issued a warning following reports on the use of bike lanes by motorcycle riders and other motorists.
Silvano has been a team member of the bike groups, IYA-AN cycling team ICT, and CEBU KASIKAD since 2017 and has been participating in some Cross-country bike races in Cebu.
Jeffrey Silvano during one of his races. | contributed photo
He says that sharing the road with other motorists for years has been a scary experience and now that the city has designated bike lanes, he hopes it will serve as an advantage for both motorists and cyclists. /bmjo