For MMDA, it’s EDSA provincial bus ban dry run Part 2

Provincial buses plying EDSA. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / LYN RILLON

BARRING any temporary restraining order from the courts, the dry run of the ban on provincial buses on EDSA will push through in the second week of August.

This was bared by Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) on Thursday as it prepares to implement another dry run of the prohibition despite the legal hurdles posed by some lawmakers. The agency was forced to stop its first dry run and postpone the implementation of the ban after lawmakers sought a temporary restraining order against the policy, saying it called for police powers that were outside the MMDA’s mandate.

A report posted in the Philippine Daily Inquirer today quoted MMDA general manager Jose Arturo “Jojo” Garcia, Jr. as telling reporters the agency would ask the Quezon City and Pasay governments to “cancel all the business permits” of provincial bus terminals in their cities before the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board’s (LTFRB) Memorandum Circular No. 2019-31 takes effect on August 2.

Garcia was quoted in the Inquirer report as promising to first address issues that cropped up during the agency’s first dry run. These include weak information dissemination and lax enforcement.

The LTFRB memorandum sets the guidelines for the impending closure of provincial bus terminals on EDSA, as well as amends the routes of some 2,000 such buses plying the thoroughfare. It calls for buses coming from the north to end their trips at the Valenzuela City interim terminal while buses from the south must stop at either the Santa Rosa, Laguna, or the Parañaque terminals.

Garcia assured commuters the interim terminals in Valenzuela and Santa Rosa are ready for the influx of provincial buses, according to the Inquirer report.

It added that 47 provincial bus terminals along EDSA would be shuttered despite court cases filed by several lawmakers in the Supreme Court and in the Quezon City Regional Trial Court if the Quezon City and Pasay local governments grant the MMDA’s request. The cases filed seek to halt the ban’s implementation.