“We have to do a lot better if we want to catch up with our neighbors.”
Last Friday, President Ferdinand Marcos. BBM inaugurated the five additional LRT 1 stations in Sucat, Paranaque, which was a bit of good news in the wake of the six successive typhoons that devastated the country. First proposed during the term of former President Joseph Estrada, the five stations cover a distance of a little over seven kilometers with two more kilometers remaining to complete the entire LRT 1 extension project.
The good DOTr Secretary said that the remaining two kilometers to Bacoor, Cavite will be completed before the term of PBBM ends in 2028. Let us all hope that this will be indeed the case. With LRT 1 reaching Sucat, the public can now at least take a more comfortable and faster ride to Baclaran and other places in the Metro area. At this juncture, however, we might like to remind ourselves that it took a generation to reach Sucat and yet, the project is still not done.
During his inauguration speech, PBBM praised all the previous administrations for their contributions. He however, omitted his father who initiated the LRT1 project in the late 1970s. If we add this first phase, we are talking almost half a century to reach 27 kilometers. We are awfully slow which seems to be our principal characteristic every time we undertake a big ticket project. For instance, the LRT 7 was also originally planned and proposed in 1980 but up to now, the whole project is yet to be completed.
We are very good at starting a lot of things but sooner or later, almost every country in the region will overtake us. Let us take the matter of railway projects. Our neighbors are now talking about high-speed trains while we are still trying to upgrade what remains of our PNR that was originally built in 1890 and was the first in Southeast Asia. Indonesia now has a high speed train with Vietnam about to follow. Several months ago, Vietnam also unveiled a plan to construct a 3,000-kilometer freeway system that will traverse the whole country from North to South. It plans to start very soon.
How about us? The late President Marcos Sr. many years ago proposed the so-called Maharlika Highway which was supposed to be our North-South Highway. Up until now, however, it is non-existent. We should be asking ourselves why our neighbors can plan and complete public work projects very fast while it will take eternity for us just to complete one. Can we not at least find a way to speed up the completion of a big project? Perhaps we lack the political will to see projects through.
Let us look at some mentioned projects like the TPLEX extension from Rosario, La Union for another eighty kilometers and the Southern Luzon Freeway extension project that will go all the way to Matnog, Sorsogon. From what we are reading and hearing, the completion of these two projects will be well into the next administration if ever. We are not even talking about extending the NLEX to the Cagayan Valley or a railway extension to Region 2.
People might have forgotten that our freeway system was in fact started by the late President Marcos Sr. when he inaugurated the 27-kilometer North Diversion Road in 1968. If I remember correctly, the last road project he inaugurated was the Pampanga viaduct. Then everything seems to have stopped before restarting again. From 1986 to the present, our freeway system built around NLEX has reached Rosario, La Union and Subic. In the South, San Pablo City has been reached. But considering that it has been about thirty eight years, I would not consider that an outstanding accomplishment.
Let us take the case of Malaysia. By 1985, it has completed a freeway from the Thai border to Singapore which has a distance of about 772 kilometers. That was 39 years ago and here we are talking about extending the TPLEX to San Fernando, La Union or the South Luzon freeway from San Pablo City to Matnog, Sorsogon. We have to do a lot better if we want to catch up with our neighbors. More importantly, we have to do it faster.
