Bautista: Chaotic Monday

THE text message woke me up like a glass of ice cold water in the face.

“[We are] advice[ing] you of the situation at Slaughter [House]… hirap ang [transport] sector at mga tao.” That came from Junie Itliong, Public Transport Affairs Office chief. That was at 9:30 in the morning (my unholiest of hours). That was a cry for media to help stop Administrative Order 011 of Mayor Reinaldo Bautista Jr.

“Fine,” I told myself, after waking up (again) at 11 am to cook lunch, “I’ll have a look at the situation when I head for the office later this afternoon.” It turned out I was only able to see the situation at about 2:30 pm.

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By that time the chaos of the morning was over. Mayor Bautista appeared to have relented to the twin appeals of La Trinidad Mayor Artemio Galwan and Gov. Nestor Fongwan (hmmmmm too many ‘wans’ in one sentence, hmmmm) for the former to hold in abeyance the AO. Well, what else would explain the jeepneys at the Tabora Park? And the absence of these jeeps at the Slaughter House staging area?

By that time I was halfway to the office and decided to walk all the way and not waste my unexpected hike.

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Anyone who has played SimCity would know traffic is one of the biggest headaches a player must be able to solve in order to run your simulated city smoothly. There is no set solution to this problem.

Simulations change as soon as you press the “New Game” button.
SimCity is set on a flat area. Building new roads is just part of the solution. There are others. It seems easy to do so, so long as you can balance your expenses with your income, which you get from businesses which pop up in population dense areas.

Anyway, the trick here is to use as little money as possible to create population centers, and the roads needed for the area, and at the same time create more income for the simulation city.

Sounds easy, but in the game it is practically impossible.

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The same could be said of running a real city. The objective is almost the same: maximize profits while minimizing expenses. And, don’t forget, keep the people happy enough to keep you in office.

The Magsaysay Avenue experiment can be said to be one of those which appears good in simulation (or paper if you like) but failed in practice. I’m sure a lot of experts put their minds together to get this thing off the ground. If reports are accurate, two years worth of planning, talks and negotiations took place (a privilege you don’t have in SimCity – where in a matter of minutes what was once a smooth traffic flow could become a bottleneck).

It failed mainly because (to my mind anyway) it did not take into consideration The People. And by The People I mean, those who will be affected by the scheme. City Hall may have failed to take into consideration the expenses it would entail for The People. Riding twice to get to a destination is fine for some, but for most, it is a big chunk off the day’s budget. And during these hard times, every centavo saved can mean the difference between an empty or half-filled stomach.

So if the experiment failed in practice, what then is the ideal solution? Well, to my mind, vehicle reduction is still the best option. There are just too many of them La Trinidad jeeps entering the city. If a scheme could be devised where the number of those jeeps entering could be reduced, it will be smoother for everyone.

But what do I know; I’m just an ordinary computer geek trying out solutions in SimCity.