A SAMAL bridge will provide 24-hour access. It will greatly enhance accessibility to the island. It will mean increased tourist arrivals. That was Region 11’s tourism director at last week’s Kapehan sa Dabaw espousing the construction of a bridge connecting mainland Davao and the island of Samal.
Fortunately, also at the Kapehan sa Dabaw, was Davao City tourism officer Lisette Marques who, courageously I thought, spoke for caution--any development has to be a good thing but there should be a plan for the environmental protection of Samal (Which there isn’t) and a clear plan on how the island is to be developed (Again which there isn’t, unless you count Davao del Norte’s avowed intent to turn unspoilt Talikud Island into another Boracay!).
Lisette’s observations hit the nail on the head. It’s why we go to Samal. Why Samal is a popular break from the concrete and traffic of Davao. Samal is green, pleasantly pastoral. Quiet. An agricultural and fishing community. Empty beaches (At least on the more hard-to-get-at eastern side).
No hustle and bustle. No motor-vehicle exhaust pollution. Talikud Island, moored off the southwestern corner of Samal is even better--no cars or trucks; only motorcycles, bicycles and carabou-carts. All these things Davao City isn’t and which you can wave goodbye if a bridge gets built.
Already, at the prospect of a bridge, you can hear land speculators dusting off their checkbooks. Samal Island would become nothing but a dormitory suburb of Davao. Vast “affordable” subdivisions would sprout--never mind that the island is lacking the most basic of infrastructures including an iffy electric supply, never mind an inadequate road system. Out-of-control development has happened, is happening in Davao, because a developers’ checkbook beats any concerns about the environment or infrastructure and it will happen on Samal.
Then there’s the traffic. A bridge would bring 40-foot juggernauts and heavy-duty 10-wheelers to service all the new development. Imagine 40 footers trying to negotiate the narrow right-angled bends of Penaplata’s one-way system. Or smoke-belching their way up the corners and inclines which lead from Kaputian. The same trucks which are destroying Davao’s suburban roads but, hey, who cares?--it’s called progress. We can get on someone’s top-10 list. The population of Samal would balloon and, naturally, look for an efficient and reliable public transport system.
We haven’t got the hang of that yet in Davao--as the city expands our city planner’s solution is to introduce new jeepney routes and franchises. A system of public transport which might have worked 50 years ago with a tenth of the population but which today is responsible for most of the city’s exhaust pollution and all of its traffic woes. What’s the betting the cancer of jeepneys spreads to Samal too?
Why such clamor for a bridge? Our city and Samal governance would have us believe it’s all to do with development, progress, improving the lot of the people and so on. I’d suggest it’s all to do with prestige: pogi points for whatever governor or mayors are sitting at the time.
A bridge is sexy, it’ll look good on postcards and don’t forget that huge amount of money swilling around, money for a civic project just itching to find its way into private pockets. --Sun.Star Davao