I just found out that the Department of Transportation and the Japan International Cooperation Agency have been evaluating alignments and soil stability for a proposed subway project to be implemented in Cebu since 2025.
According to current engineering assessments, Cebu’s geography and soil are conducive to such a project. Well and good. But we all know that is not the issue here.
The Philippine government has always excelled in coming up with great — and sometimes not-so-great — ideas to help uplift the lives of the suffering masses. In the last decade, it has zeroed in on trying to address Metro Cebu’s growing traffic problem.
Remember the Metro Cebu Expressway?
Construction on the 56.9-kilometer road network, designed to connect the City of Naga in the south to Danao City in the north by bypassing coastal areas, began in 2018. It started with a 4.55-kilometer segment from Naga to neighboring Minglanilla. However, that segment has not even been completed.
Apparently, the Department of Public Works and Highways went ahead with the project even though right-of-way issues had not been finalized. It also didn’t help that a 360-meter portion in Naga collapsed in late 2023 due to landslides.
The project was finally removed from the National Government’s Priority Infrastructure Flagships Programs, with Gov. Pamela Baricuatro formally offering to lead its implementation through a public-private partnership model last October.
So far, there have been no takers. Not that I know of, anyway. But what I do know is that I’m pretty sure I won’t be alive to see this project completed. I don’t mean to sound morbid, just realistic.
At the rate it is going, it will take another 112 years to finish the whole thing if the government does it alone. It might even take longer since, in the last eight years, work on the four-kilometer section in Naga is still ongoing. Now, whether my math is right or not is another thing, but one thing is certain: the Metro Cebu Expressway won’t be finished soon — unless, of course, there’s a miracle.
Speaking of miracles, I’m sure there are people out there who are wondering what has happened to the Cebu Bus Rapid Transit project.
Conceptualized back in the 1990s, the groundbreaking for the project’s Package 1 finally took place in February 2023. The route runs from the Cebu South Bus Terminal along N. Bacalso Ave. to the Provincial Capitol at the end of Osmeña Blvd., a stretch of 2.38 kilometers. For all intents and purposes, it’s done. The three futuristic bus stops — trust me, they are not bus stations — have been standing for quite some time. The fourth one in front of the Capitol building was even taken down because it violated a heritage law. The fact that it took just over a year to complete a one-kilometer stretch is indeed a miracle.
The thing is, the bus stops are gathering dust. There were initial test runs and operations late last year, but the public was more concerned about the devastation brought about by typhoon Tino.
That brings me back to the proposed Metro Cebu Subway system. It will be 65 kilometers long, connecting Carcar City in the south to Danao in the north. To describe it as ambitious would be the understatement of the century.
If the project ever gets off the ground, there will be no trace left of me in my grave — assuming that Cebu’s eastern seaboard is still above ground and not underwater.