Closing Kennon Road

"This is how not to govern."

When Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong conducted a recent inspection of Kennon Road, he was briefed that the iconic road needs five years to rest. The translation of this is obvious—the road will be closed for five years.

That newspaper report mentioned a lot of reasons causing the frequent landslides during the rainy season. According to these experts, the principal cause of the landslides was the big earthquake in 1990—a full 29 years ago. There were other reasons mentioned but unfortunately, not the most important one. Many mining tunnels have been dug on the mountains along the road. Because of this, the mountains are unable to hold water thereby weakening the mountain soil which in turn is the reason causing the frequent slides. This conclusion was the result of a study done many years ago.

The other cause is simply poor engineering road work. The drainage system of the road, for instance, is inadequate. The amount of rain received by Baguio and environs is about 169 inches a year which should give our engineers food for thought when repairing the road.

Still another problem is the unrestricted construction of houses beside the road.

The problems on Kennon Road are well-known to most Baguio residents. For instance, they are aware that when it rains continuously for a few days, landslides do occur. These require the DPWH to close the road for a few days but opens it again to the public when the rain stops and minor clearing operations are done.

During the dry season, the road is open most of the time.

Kennon Road has now been closed longer than when it was closed due to the 1990 earthquake. Only residents are allowed to use the road because, according to the DPWH, it is not safe. I fail to see, however, why it is safe for about 10,000 residents along the road but unsafe for non-residents. If the road is indeed unsafe to use, it should be unsafe for everyone.

Barangay officials have even established check points to ensure that non-residents cannot use the road like the exclusive subdivisions of Metro Manila. Considering the gridlock along the Ben Palispis or Marcos Highway especially towards the weekends, the DPWH should seriously consider providing a window wherein other motorists can use Kennon Road for a few hours during the day and on good weather for small vehicles like cars and SUVs to provide relief along Marcos Highway. The DPWH is already opening the road during special occasions like the Philippine Military Graduation, Holy Week and the Christmas holiday season. In spite of other access roads to the city, Kennon is still the preferred route to and from Baguio.

Sooner or later, the DPWH will have to provide a better reason for closing the road to all traffic except those living along the road. I hope that the reason for the prolonged closure is because of safety as stated by the DPWH and not because of other reasons that are only known to them.

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The other issue being frequently discussed about Baguio City is the need to save it. The discussion centers mostly on the dwindling number of pine trees, overdevelopment and the whole issue of livability. If there is tremendous overcrowding, the quality of life inevitably suffers. With regard to the vanishing pine trees, there appears to be a plan by the new city government under Mayor Magalong to pass an ordinance requiring every family to plant and take care of one pine tree. There is also another proposal to severely restrict the cutting of pine trees. On overdevelopment, a plan is being hatched to ban the new construction of multi-story buildings to try to preserve whatever green space is left in the city.

What has happened to the city over the years is a classic example of how not to govern a city. The deterioration is so plain to see that one does not have to be an urban planner to see how bad the situation has become.

The talk about saving the city is well and good—but how exactly is it going to be done? There is a need for a professionally crafted road map to follow and not simply to point to some observable defects. Overpopulation for example is one problem. The area of Baguio is about 47 square kilometers with a population of about 350,000. If the terrain were flat like the City of Manila whose area is about the same, 350,000 can be accommodated without many problems. But since Baguio is mountainous with very limited available spaces for safe residential and commercial areas, where will the city government pack the many people coming to the city to live?

And this is only one problem. How about the other problems? Mayor Magalong certainly has inherited a lot of challenges. The good thing is that the good mayor has the right attitude in that he realizes the tremendous challenges he is facing. For instance on the issue of preserving the remaining heritage structures in the city like the post office, he is the first mayor that I know of who issued a statement about the need to preserve the old city post office which is now being reconfigured due to the addition of unauthorized commercial establishments. The post office is the only remaining American era public building still in use. Maybe what the mayor should do is to stop issuing business permits to these commercial establishments to force them to close shop. I wish him well and hope that he succeeds.