Traffic and hard ride have always been the trademarks of daily quotidian especially during holiday season and commuter rush hour especially during the days approaching Christmas day.
It happened one Monday in December when events and stage director Arnie Alesna and I just got from a technical rehearsal for the virtual book launch of the book “SekSinema (Gender Images in Philippine Sex Cinema Enfolding Pandemia)” which I humbly wrote.
Arnie and I live one village apart here in San Pedro City so we went home together.
We were at the BBL Transit terminal in Taft Avenue corner Buendia in Pasay City at about five thirty in the afternoon but we were able to board a bus at about seven in the evening. It was like eternity waiting when Alesna learned from a staff of the bus line that only one unit—as in last trip at an early hour—could accommodate a long queue of passengers from end to end of the vast bay.
There was a commotion, congregation and confusion among seniors, PWD, pregnant women and the regular riders when the last one of the buses came in.
There was an argument on who would be taken in first—the special passengers or the common queues of ordinary people. Of course, the rule of law sufficed and the dispatch paved the way for the priority lane.
When everyone was accommodated, it was like a can of sardines packed not of fishes but of human passengers.
Why can’t BBL Transit provide enough rides for the public since a transport system isn’t only for profit but for public service as well? Why can’t the LTO or LTFRB streamline policies about providing rides especially on peak hours?
Passengers should demand easier access to transportation and not be dictated by the whims of bus companies and operators as if the big transport businesses control the roads when commuters as consumers have also the right to convenience.