AFTER two postponements, the Colon night shopping festival finally opened last Friday despite threat of rain.
George Chu, president of the Cebu City Downtown Revitalization Project, said the organizers had to come up with a “proper system” to avoid complaints from businesses in the area, and got the necessary clearances from City Hall and the City Traffic Operations Management (Citom) board before holding the festival.
The ongoing festival aims to promote the small and medium entrepreneurs in the downtown area and bring back interest in Colon, part of the old business district in Cebu City.
“Hopefully, we can sustain this to revive downtown’s old glory and (promote) Colon Street as a world-class night market like other old streets in Asia,” he said.
Although part of the Cebu Business Month 2008 in June, the festival opened only last Friday. It was originally set to open on July 14, was postponed to June 22 and got moved again.
More organized
Having learned from the previous two Colon Shopping Festivals, Chu said the Downtown Revitalization Project Team has come up with a “well-controlled and more organized setup” for the festival’s night market this month.
Before the opening, the Cebu City Government—together with representatives of some schools, business establishments and vendor associations—held a “Cebu Heritage Walk” from the Colon Monument (an obelisk marking Colon as the oldest street in the country) to a space on the road in front of the old Plaza Fair.
Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Edward Gaisano, who considers Colon as a “street of nostalgia and history,” lauded the joint efforts of the government and the private sector in reviving the oldest street in the country.
The dream of reviving Colon Street resulted in the formation of the Downtown Revitalization Project that Cebu City Vice Mayor Michael Rama spearheaded.
The festival features a night market that will open at 5 p.m. and close at 2 a.m. from July 10 to August 10. Only 170 vendors are allowed to occupy the tents put up on the center line from Junquera St. to Colon St., specifically fronting Gaisano Metro.
Subsidy
Public utility jeepneys still ply these roads and neighboring establishments can still enjoy the influx of consumers, said Chu.
He added that tenants of the night market will only pay P150 per day for the electricity, cleaning, security and other operational expenses as the Cebu City Government will be subsidizing their taxes.
These tenants are small and medium entrepreneurs selling accessories, bags, shoes and street food, among others. About 70 percent of them are regular participants in previous Colon Shopping Festivals.
Every year, Chu said organizers seek ways to improve the festival through better compliance to security and traffic regulations.
“After this, we want to focus on vendors who have been dislocated for selling illegal items, such as pirated DVDs. We want to eliminate illegal vending that has increased significantly in the downtown area,” Chu said.
He admitted that the festival’s major challenge has always been on how to strictly implement the rules since most of the vendors are “unschooled” and some would “sell” their rights in the night market to other vendors.
He also pointed out that many vendors would fight each other over a tent since the night market promises huge return of investment.
“For vendors selling street food, they would earn around P1,000 a night from selling puso (hanging rice) at P2 (alone). Others selling various items would earn around P500 to P1,000 per night,” said Chu, who makes regular rounds at the night market. (NRC)
