Thursday, November 23, 2006 Utility firms fail to heed rule to bury cables, wires
SPAGHETTI wires of utility companies should have started disappearing this year.
It was found out during the Cebu City Council public hearing on bundling and color-coding of wires and cables yesterday that utility firms were to have “partially” laid the wires underground this year.
A 2001 ordinance gave the firms five years to implement partial underground cabling and to fully implement it in 10 years or by 2011.
The Cebu Utilities Group, an organization of utilities and telecommunication companies, also told the council that cables and wires in major roads and routes for the Asean are already 80 percent bundled.
This cost members and local government units P8.1 million.
The public hearing was held because of a proposed measure by Councilor Hilario Davide III to regulate the installation of transmission lines by public utilities in Cebu City.
The measure proposes for firms to maintain their lines, remove unused poles and mark their lines with distinct colors for easy identification.
A fine of P3,000 to P5,000 is being proposed for violators.
In the public hearing, Councilor Rodrigo Abellanosa asked if it is possible for the utility and telecommunication firms to place their cables underground.
In the course of the discussion, Councilor Nestor Archival mentioned City Ordinance 1894, which created a utility lines installation coordinating committee as sub-committee for the technical infrastructure committee currently headed by Councilor Gabriel Leyson.
Section 7 of the ordinance set as “medium term objective” for the committee to “promote the partial implementation for underground installation of utility line five years after approval.
The council approved the ordinance on April 4, 2001.
The committee’s long term objective is to require the “mandatory grounding of all utility lines” 10 years after the approval of the ordinance.
But Visayan Electric Co.’s Paulino Hubahib, who represented the utilities’ group, said in an interview with Sun.Star Cebu that it will be very expensive.
The cost will be 10 times more than the amount spent for installing cables aboveground.
“Wala pa. Mahal man gyud, (No one has done it yet because it’s expensive),” he said when asked if all members have started complying.
But Councilor Jocelyn Pesquera said the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) already laid its fiber optic cables underground.
She asked if PLDT could have other utilities use its facility for a fee.
PLDT’s Juvy Mark Rosario replied that theirs is an outdated facility whose software may not be able to handle the load.
In his presentation during the hearing, Hubahib said the group also bundled the dangling wires along the Sinulog 2006 route, the North Reclamation Area, and the ones near the Malacañang sa Sugbo.
“Five major routes covering priority areas of Cebu, Mandaue, and Lapu-Lapu vities are 100 percent completed,” he reported.
The same is true for the wires at the City Hall area, Escario St. leading to the Capitol, the road to the Taoist Temple, Gorordo Ave. and Veteran’s Drive, which leads to the Marco Polo Plaza Hotel.
Major locations within Metro Cebu that will be visited by the Asean summit ministers’ spouses, though, are still “60 percent” complete as of last Friday. (RHM)
