Home » Traffic Management
Category Archives: Traffic Management
After getting engrossed with EDSA, is Marcos Highway next?
If you monitored the news articles and social media post over the past two decades, there seems to be an obsession for EDSA. Circumferential Road 4 is the busiest corridor in Metro Manila, stretching across several jurisdictions including Caloocan, Quezon City, Mandaluyong, Makati and Pasay City. Aside from the MMDA, national agencies like the DPWH and DOTr have been heavily involved in traffic schemes and transportation infrastructure development along the corridor. These include variants of the travel demand management (TDM) scheme commonly called number coding. Since the 1990s, there’s the Line 3 and several overpasses/flyovers and underpass that have been constructed along major intersections (e.g., EDSA-Shaw, EDSA-Ortigas, EDSA-Kamuning, EDSA-Quezon Avenue, etc.). Nowadays, people are more into the EDSA carousel and most recently the pavement rehabilitation for EDSA. It seems we failed to realize that EDSA is just one corridor. There are others that also demand attention including those in other parts of the country.
Recently, a “carmaggedon” along Marcos Highway was in the headlines or shall I say was trending in social media. There was a lot of excitement for what has been a recurring nightmare to those residing along the corridor. I recall something worse occurred more than 15 years ago (pre-Ondoy), before social media and influencers and digital creators. At the time, Line 2 terminated at Santolan Station. And even back then, the MMDA insisted on playing with their U-turn scheme. I don’t recall a more in-depth study that could have involved micro-simulation modeling being done for the corridor. And since then, populations and traffic have grown steadily and as I’ve written about previously, the extension of Line 2 to Masinag seems to have had little impact on traffic. And so here we are with the MMDA still insisting on tweaking their U-turn schemes and relying mainly on gut-feel instead of a more scientific approach that may actually lead to more sound solutions for the corridor.
Approach to Marcos Highway from Felix Avenue – that’s the elevated Line 2 superstructure behind the Cainta arch.
Intersection of Marcos Highway, Felix Avenue and Gil Fernando Avenue – there’s a major foot bridge installed here so people can cross at the intersection, which used to be a signalized junction before the MMDA opted for U-turns for Marcos Highway sections under its jurisdiction.
Marcos Highway section fronting the Ayala Feliz Mall – the MMDA has played with the location of the U-turn slots in the vicinity of the Marcos Highway-Amang Rodriguez-J.P. Rizal intersection as they tried to determine the “optimum” locations of these slots.
Of course, there is also the case of Commonwealth Avenue. How many carmaggedons have occurred along that corridor? Isn’t it an everyday thing there? And there’s also Ortigas Avenue Extension and many other roads and streets where congestion seems to have been accepted as the norm. How do we make travel easier for most people? How do we improve commutes given the constraints and realities concerning behavior and choices?
–
Complicated intersections in Rizal – Tikling Junction
There are several major intersections in Rizal Province. Among them are 3 junctions in Cainta, Taytay and Antipolo – Cainta Junction (Ortigas Ave Ext.-Felix Ave), Masinag Junction (Marcos Highway-Sumulong Highway), and Tikling or Kaytikling Junction. The first two are signalized intersections. The last one is supposed to be a roundabout. All three are problematic in various ways and have been associated with congestion along the major roads intersecting at these junctions.
Tikling is quite interesting as traffic seems to have worsened after it was set up as a roundabout. Taytay enforcers have been deployed here but they seem to contribute more to worsening congestion rather than easing it. Motorists familiar with the area will tell you that traffic is better when there are no enforcers. Unfortunately, not all motorists here are from the area or are familiar with the rules for navigating or positioning at a roundabout. And so the intersection is often constricted with vehicles whose drivers and riders don’t practice courtesy.
Perhaps a combination of geometric improvements and more clever enforcement/management can improve intersection performance?
–
On roundabouts and how they can improve safety at intersections
Roundabouts are perhaps something that should be considered for Philippine roads. The concern, however, is that Philippine drivers don’t know how to navigate or position themselves in roundabouts. And the results as we have seen in several cases are congested roundabouts or rotundas.
AASHTO (September 26, 2025) “State DOTs Highlight How Roundabouts Improve Safety,” AASHTO Journal, https://aashtojournal.transportation.org/state-dots-highlight-how-roundabouts-improve-safety/%5BLast accessed: 10/19/2025]
To quote from the article:
“To highlight the safety benefits of roundabouts, the Ohio Department of Transportation recently released an analysis of crash data from 76 intersections statewide that had been converted to roundabouts. That analysis indicated single lane roundabouts decreased injury crashes by 69 percent while multi-lane roundabouts resulted in a 25 percent decline.”
And here another quotable from the same article:
“For us, it’s simple. Roundabouts remove cross-traffic turns and eliminate T-bone crashes, while improving traffic flow,” said PennDOT Secretary Mike Carroll …”“Any design that dramatically reduces the most serious crashes we see on the road is worthy of consideration in our projects.”
The article also includes a YouTube video on traffic circles.
–
Traffic congestion along EDSA
I’ve taken some photos of EDSA traffic as well as the EDSA Carousel buses. Here are the more recent EDSA photos I took as I traveled from Makati to Quezon City after serving as a panelist in the Energy Transitions Dialogue last Wednesday.
I took this photo as we passed Guadalupe. I like this in the sense that it shows the clear ROW for the EDSA Carousel buses. One wonders why most of these motorists would prefer to drive their vehicles rather than take the bus or the MRT.
You can see in the photo that EDSA’s northbound side is clogged as far as the eye could see. If you check the image under the MRT bridge, it shows the southbound side was also congested. These photos were taken around 4 PM so this was still an hour before most people would be going home from work.
I mentioned in my comments at the panel that one consequence of giving number coding exemption to electric and hybrid vehicles is that this further diminishes the effectiveness (is it still effective?) of the MMDA’s number coding scheme. I don’t have the stats of how many EV’s and hybrids are registered and running in Metro Manila. Those numbers combined with actual counts will tell us how they are impacting traffic. That would be a nice topic for a paper. 🙂
The photos pretty much describe the transport situation in Metro Manila. Many of our major cities will be heading this way unless they improve their public transportation fast. If they do, then public transport mode share will be sustained if not increased. Metro Manila’s is already being eroded by inefficient public transport, motorcycles (including taxis) and perhaps unintentionally, electric and hybrid vehicles.
–
Is it possible to have zero traffic deaths in a year?
Is it possible to have zero traffic deaths in a year? Is it even probable? As it turns out, yes. Here’s an article on what Helsinki did in order to make this a reality:
Andrei, M. (August 1, 2025) “Helsinki went a full year without a traffic death. How did they do it?” ZME Science, https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-science/helsinki-went-a-full-year-without-a-traffic-death-how-did-they-do-it/ [Last accessed: 8/19/2025]
To quote from the article:
“A lot of factors contributed to this, but speed limits are one of the most important,” said Roni Utriainen, a traffic engineer with the city’s Urban Environment Division.
More than half of Helsinki’s streets have a speed limit of 30 km/h (approximately 20 mph). Half a century ago, the city barely had half of its area with a 50 km/h limit (30 mph). They gradually worked to reduce the speed limit, especially around schools and kindergartens.
Smarter street design also played a key role. Pedestrian and cycling infrastructure was prioritized for upgrades in recent years. More and more people started using public transit or bikes, or just walking. Substantial investments also made public transit more efficient and reliable.“Public transport in Helsinki is excellent, which reduces car use, and with it, the number of serious accidents,” Utriainen noted.
Another key component was bringing the police on board. Helsinki introduced automated traffic cameras and enforcement systems, which also helped bring down reckless driving.”
On the need to rethink traffic metrics
While Level of Service (LOS) criteria is a concept that can be applied to many other transportation facilities and aspects, among the LOS criteria that have been the subject of much criticism (and perhaps rightfully so especially in the context of safety) are the ones used for intersections. These are associated with delay reduction, which always favors vehicular throughput. The latter means basically, high LOS corresponds to prioritizing car (or motor vehicle) movement while not particularly taking into consideration the safety and movement needs of other road users (not using motor vehicles). Here is an interesting article on this matter:
Boenau, A. (July 9, 2025) “The old traffic math that keeps destroying neighborhoods,” Fast Company, https://www.fastcompany.com/91362348/road-design-traffic-math-destroying-neighborhoods-los [Last accessed: 7/15/2025]
Quoting from the article:
Here are three important questions for experts to ponder:
- Is slow-moving car traffic ever safer than fast-moving traffic?
- Do we have any obligation to provide safe and convenient access for people when they aren’t inside cars?
- What are the economic downsides of wider, faster streets in the central business district?
When planners and engineers truly wrestle with those questions, they can choose to remain a conformist who ignores the damage of traffic metrics, or become an outlier in the industry and make a positive impact that might be felt for generations to come. Things can get better in the end.
–
Again, I must say that rethinking roads and streets should be context sensitive. Still, safety should be the top concern especially for areas that is predominantly residential and/or school. Safety, after all, comes first in the definitions of transportation and traffic engineering.
–
Quick comments on the NCAP
The No Contact Apprehension Policy (NCAP) is finally being implemented in Metro Manila. The results so far has been dramatic in terms of the number of violations recorded and the images being shared so far about how motorists are behaving. Below is one of those photos being shared on social media to which I added some annotations. I will use this later to comment on the NCAP and how we can use the outcomes to assess the transportation situation and determine what interventions can be done. Some are already obvious from the photo – the lack of public transport options lead to people depending on private motor vehicles like cars and motorcycles for their commutes. MRT7 is yet to be operational and road public transport has not been rationalized.
More on this topic soon!
–
On transportation problems being treated like diseases
I am sharing this relatively old article on transportation problems needing treatments as if these were diseases. I say it’s ‘old’ because it’s from last year, and these days when much content is being pushed everywhere including mainstream and social media, things get old, quickly. Rewind to more than a decade ago and Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) wasn’t as popularly applied as today and Artificial Intelligence (AI) seems to be everywhere now including in transportation systems.
Menard, T. (September 1, 2024) “Transportation Rx: Treating Traffic Glut Like Doctors Treat Sinus Congestion,” Planetizen, https://www.planetizen.com/features/131478-transportation-rx-treating-traffic-glut-doctors-treat-sinus-congestion [Last accessed: 4/21/2025]
To quote from the article:
“Traffic congestion is not unlike congestion that builds up in the human airways. When we see a doctor, we are prescribed a treatment that clears the backup. Similarly for roads, rather than setting up road signs and cones to redirect traffic, cities can take a more prescribed treatment approach through methods such as congestion pricing and other road pricing strategies, as well as technologies like edge computing, navigation-enabled Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) modeling, and transit signal prioritization. “
This is not the first article to allude to medicine when the topic is traffic congestion. There are others that use terminology from the human body’s circulatory system. When an artery gets blocked, a bypass can be a solution. But perhaps we don’t need bypasses and look at other. more effective ways of dealing with transportation problems.
–
A new bottleneck along Marcos Highway in Antipolo City?
I’ve been wondering why there seems to be much congestion along the westbound side of Marcos Highway in the morning just before we reach SM Cherry. It is usually flowing there but the past weeks when we used the route instead of Sumulong Highway, traffic was really bad. As I am quite observant about the traffic and always looking for reasons or causes, I found that this was due to the alternative route Antipolo ‘opened’ that many motorists now take when traveling between Marikina and the side of Antipolo heading in the general direction of Cogeo.
The alternate route connects Marcos Highway and Sumulong Highway via TOCS Avenue (which intersects Marcos Highway near SM Cherry) and Sampaguita Street (which intersects Sumulong Highway past Masinag Junction and near the Hillside Centre Plaza before Soliven Avenue). If you’re coming from Marikina and heading in the direction of Cogeo or even Antipolo Simbahan then this route may provide shorter travel time as you won’t have to go around Masinag Junction to make an effective left turn to Marcos Highway (direct left turns at Masinag are not allowed).
This is the view from the queue approaching the intersection of TOCS Avenue with Marcos Highway from the eastbound side of the highway. Note that traffic is not flowing from the junction along the eastbound (Metro Manila bound) side of the highway.
A closer look with vehicles turning left to Marcos Highway from TOCS Avenue. There are usually Antipolo traffic enforcers facilitation (read: favoring) traffic from and to TOCS Avenue. This results to build-up along Marcos Highway where most traffic is through traffic.
The resulting congestion affects many travelers including freight along the westbound (Metro Manila-bound) direction of Marcos Highway.
While the alternate route likely provides shorter travel times for those coming from Marikina to Antipolo/Cogeo and vice versa, this is at the expense of more people and goods who and that travel along Marcos Highway. Antipolo should realize this even with basic observations on the traffic build-up in the area. Traffic for that alternate route should not be prioritized to the detriment of travelers along Marcos Highway.
–
Counterflow lanes in Bangkok, Thailand
I almost forgot again about this set of photos showing the implementation of a counterflow scheme along a long stretch of road in Bangkok. Heading out of Bangkok, I was able to take photos of the counterflow lanes and variable traffic signs used for this purpose. We were northbound meaning we were traveling outbound of the metropolis and opposed to the peak direction (southbound was inbound to Bangkok).
Approaching an overpass where variable traffic signs are installed overhead (i.e., on a gantry).
It is easy to see which lanes are assigned for our direction and which ones for the opposite flow.
On the overpass, you can see that the variable signs are installed at regular intervals. There are a few cones that act as physical separators (not really barriers) between opposing flows.
Sort of a close up of the variable signs and a cone. I assume the cones are placed there by traffic authorities. They might be transferred to the other side of the overpass if the counterflow was in favor of our direction.
Another photo showing the installed variable signs towards the other end of the overpass.
Four lanes are assigned to inbound traffic while only two are for outbound traffic.
At the foot of the overpass is a pedestrian overpass. The stairs appear to be quite steep based on the photo. I’m not aware of criticisms of the pedestrian footbridges in Bangkok. I would have to ask my Thai friends about their designs.
Another overpass where all lanes are assigned to the southbound direction
The parked vehicle on the chevron is with the traffic authority of Bangkok.
I actually started writing this in April last year. I will try to finish some drafts I started last year this month while also posting about my recent travel to Bicol.
–
Caught (up) in traffic 