THE situation is this: it is late afternoon or early evening, and you've just gotten off work or school. Home is someplace far away from downtown – think Bugo, Iponan, or Lumbia – and you don't own a car or motorcycle. It's been a long day for you, and while there might be a million or so things on your mind, one thought dominates all the rest: get home.
You step out into the street and hope to catch a ride. If you're like most people, you'd take the jeep because it's simply the cheapest option. The first jeep that would take you to your place rolls by – it's full. Then a second, and a third, and so on – all of them full. You feel your temper flaring up, your blood pressure rising, but please calm down... It really can't be helped. It's rush hour. At this point it would seem that you have two options available: (1) wait it out, even if that means you're stuck in the city for the next three hours or so, or (2) take a taxi, which can get really expensive if you live far away (but look on the bright side – at least you'll arrive home in comfort and in style!)
Over at city legislative hall, the city council bicker and dicker about a lot of other things, and after what feels like forever they finally pass legislation on this thing or that. But for some reason, they never get around to addressing the everyday issues that directly affect the lives of the man and woman on the street, such as reforming the public transport system here in this city. There are just too few public vehicles and way too many commuters. If they're thinking that this is one problem that'll probably solve itself or go away on its own given enough time, they are sorely mistaken: with plenty of new people streaming into Cagayan de Oro plus the notoriously high Filipino birthrate that translates into more future schoolchildren, this problem is only going to get much worse.
And no, more public vehicles is not the solution here. More cars on the road means more thoroughfares looking like parking lots even when it's not rush hour. If you want real-life examples, look no further than Metro Manila's EDSA, or the streets of Cebu City if you prefer something closer to home.
“What is city hall going to do about it?” you ask. Nothing, perhaps.
“So what am I supposed to do about it?” Now that, my friend, is a question I can help you out with. Earlier I presented only options 1 and 2 – the ones available to most people. As an early Christmas gift to Sunstar readers, I shall now give you options 3 and 4.
Option 3 is to take an unregistered public vehicle, more commonly known as “colorum.” They can take the form of unmarked vans or jeeps, but the kind I'm more familiar with are the small, newfangled mango-yellow motorcabs that ply the streets as early as 6:30 pm. Early in the evening you'll need a sharp eye to catch them on the road because they won't linger around to pick up fares for fear of getting busted by traffic cops. If you know where to look, there are places where you can see four or five of them queued up and quietly collecting passengers on the sly. They charge a wee bit higher than the usual amount you pay to get home though, but I'm sure you won't mind.
“It's not our fault that people seek us out for a ride home,” one illegal motorcab driver told me. “The city government's not doing anything to help all these people having a hard time getting home, so it's natural for us to want to provide a solution and make some money at the same time.”
Option 4 is safer and 100% legal, but it'll require some more money (but a lot less than what you'd pony up for a taxi!), a smartphone, and an app called Angkas. It's like Grab and Uber, but for motorcycle rides: you mark your pick-up point and your destination on the map, and a motorcycle driver will arrive shortly to get you from point A to point B. Angkas drivers are professionals: they're friendly and well-dressed, and they'll lend you a helmet emblazoned with the Angkas logo and a sheer hygienic cap to wear under it. The only real downside I can think of when it comes to the Angkas service is that the insides of their passenger helmets are so thickly padded that it makes small talk with the driver a little difficult. This is just a minor complaint though, so I highly recommend this service.
These are just short-term solutions to be sure, but it can't be helped – if city hall won't even lift a finger to make commuting easier, then we as private individuals will just have to get creative and take matters into our own hands.