Christmas driving tips

Is the daily struggle along Edsa just about to make it to the record books? RICHARD REYES

It’s that time of the year again, when the holiday spirit descends upon us. For Manileños, this also means “carmageddon,” a season of chaotic, massive, wide-reaching traffic. What to do during these tough times? Here are some practical and useful tips:

Plan ahead, way ahead; organize your short trips into a single long trip. Because of all these massive traffic jams, it’s best to plan ahead, schedule everything in advance, and have a specific route in mind so you can maximize your time. If your daily commute sees you driving from Quezon City to Makati and back, plan all of your activities to be done in Quezon City before heading to Makati. Likewise, finish everything you need to in Makati before heading back to Quezon City.

Also, you can schedule meetings successively in the same place with 15-30 minute intervals, and bring your laptop or mobile device so you can work online while waiting for your coworkers and colleagues, who most likely will be late! This is so you won’t be sawing back and forth the Metro.

Work from home. While this might sound like a lazy option, you can actually accomplish more if you work out of the house given that option. Imagine getting ready, then driving to work, finding some place to park and then driving back home. That’s possibly five to six hours of your day wasted doing nothing, hours that could have been devoted to work, or leisure time, with your family and friends. And you wouldn’t have added to the traffic on the road!

With fast Internet service becoming commonplace, editing documents, reviewing spreadsheets, and attending to graphic work and then sending them out are now a breeze. Video calls are also easy, and very affordable, thanks to online mobile apps such as Viber, Facetime, Wechat and Line. You can have one-on-one discussions or conversations face-to-face using these apps, without ever having to leave your home.

Be a Wazer! The mobile navigation app Waze has really revolutionized driving in traffic and navigating through unknown roads to a new destination. I’ve tried it successfully many times over, most recently a drive from Indang, Cavite, to Metro Manila and back via Governor Drive. I’ve never been to Indang until this recent trip and Waze successfully navigated me through mostly unfamiliar territory to my home.

Waze also alerts you where traffic lies and if there are any accidents on the road, and it is able to plot quickly a new course, oftentimes within seconds but sometimes might take one to two minutes. The only downside with Waze is that it is reliant on mobile Internet access. Of course Waze is a two-way street: You have to do your part and report traffic irregularities on the road. But to many Wazers, that’s part of the fun! It’s free, available on both Android and Apple OS devices.

Leave your car at home. Walk, bike, commute or carpool with family and friends. Enduring traffic is a nerve-wracking experience in itself, but trying to find parking space when you are in a rush is a double whammy if you have brought your car AND endured the traffic. Sure, it might be tough finding your way home if you don’t have a car, but you can always carpool again, or wait for traffic to die down a bit and look for public transport going home. If you’re walking home or pedaling back to the house, those are always good exercises to burn off all those Christmas party love handles!

Pick your battles. Sounds like a wedding advice, but this holds so true for everyday traffic! Traffic driving is war, and you can’t expect to win every single time. If you can afford to put off going somewhere, or your trip isn’t critical and immediate, put it off until you have more reasons (more work, errands or activities scheduled in that area) to visit a particular area or place. It is a sheer waste of time, energy, resources and fuel, plus wear and tear on your vehicle (as well as your body and sanity!) if you need to visit a place for a simple unimportant task or activity if you could have put it off.

Additional advice for Christmas driving:

Always park in a well-lit area near a security guard. Evil elements prefer to work in the dark.

Always keep your valuables hidden in the trunk, the center console or glove compartment. Better yet, leave them at home. Laptops, laptop bags, mobile phone devices, media devices, cameras, etc., should never be left in plain view inside the car. This gives thieves more reasons to break into your car.

Keep your windows rolled up and your doors locked at all times. Some bad elements employ children who will surround your vehicle singing Christmas carols while one or two of them attempt to quietly break into your car and grab valuables.

Buy your car a theft deterrent device as a Christmas gift. Tints help keep prying eyes away, an alarm alerts you and others of possible ongoing break-ins, and a steering wheel lock clamped against the dashboard or a pedal lock clamped to the steering wheel will deter thieves away. Given enough time, thieves can render these devices useless, but in reality, a thief’s window of opportunity is also very small: The more time and effort he needs to break in and steal your car and/or its contents, the less likely he will choose your car to victimize. The more advanced alarm systems employ a GPS- or SIM card-based transponder that can locate your vehicle in case it is stolen.

Christmas traffic also means people are irritable; after a while, people tend to drive aggressively. A mini-DV recorder/dash camera will be useful; turn it on to “record” once you are inside the car. It will help record accidents and show the cause for it, or record acts of corruption by erring police officers and traffic constables.

Keep your car in tip-top shape this Christmas. Christmas means long stints behind the wheel, idling in traffic with all your electrical accessories on, the engine under heavy load. Make sure your car won’t overheat or your car’s battery is in decent charging condition. Also make sure your tires are properly inflated so you don’t suffer breakdowns while on the road, causing more traffic.

I always tell people that traffic driving is all about managing expectations. You know that the traffic will be heavy, so your output will easily be less, realistically by a half or probably more. So knowing you will only be able to accomplish half your normal output means you have to be creative and work harder: Leave earlier for work, leave later for home, plan ahead, organize and schedule everything in advance, and work at home if you can. Keep your spirit cool and have a Merry Christmas!