Name: Recil Marie D. Boragay Professor: Engr. Ryan S.

Guevarra
Year and Course: 3rd Year BS Civil Engineering Block: B

PROBLEMS TRANSPORT SYSTEM IN THE PHILIPPINES

Geographic variables play a vital role in our country's transportation system. The
Philippines, as we all know, is a large archipelago surrounded by bodies of water, with 7640
islands, a mountainous interior, narrow or broken plains, and valleys along the coastlines and in
the interior, and crisscrossed by numerous rivers. Our geography has affected mobility as well as
the transportation infrastructure that exists in our nation.
Based on the Asian Development Bank, the Philippines had been acknowledged for its
development in the quality of transport system although the preponderance of it is in poor
condition and lacks integration owing to poor governance. In fact, our annual investment in the
road system is the lowest among Southeast Asian countries, posing a barrier to our network's
development. The allocation is not sufficient to execute plans. Engineers resort to substandard
materials, reliance on dubious alternatives, and inadequate infrastructure upkeep. This frequently
puts the integrity of the infrastructure in jeopardy. This is evident to the poor quality of roads
in metropolitan areas and the poor mobility of vehicles during rush hours. In fact, among the 60
cities studied in the world by Oliver Wyman Forum and the University of California, Berkeley,
Manila ranked 48th for Sustainable Mobility and 56th for public transit. This only imply that the
roads were not sufficient to alleviate the congestion, speed times, and station density,
especially, that there were several modes of transportation. There were jeepneys, metro lines, and
bikes, however, give the country’s multimodal strengths, the inability of those in authority to
create a plan for an organized traffic system hindered the ability of the country to resolve the
problem in traffic congestion. They resorted in a trial and error system wherein they were trying
to discover a solution by coding. However, regardless of the effort, there were no visible
improvement seen unless, the underlying factors like population, public transport, etc. that
contribute to traffic congestion were being addressed.
Population can influence of the traffic. People creates movement by going to different
destination to connect with other people. The more people present in an area, more movement
can be seen that can either be good or bad depending on the capacity of the transport system
available in a place. In the Philippines, it seems like people did not anticipate the possible
population growth and number of private vehicle owners. The roads were designed for a certain
amount of road users only. Now, as the population within an area grow, a saturated roads were
seen, creating congestion and affecting the productivity of people. The government must take
this problem seriously because as this traffic congestion remained the economic prosperity can
not be attained. Also, on the study conducted by Jerold Joseph Fernandez et. al, traffic signs
were often ignored by drivers for a reason that they cannot understand the traffic signs and
authorities failed to enforce the signs. Our lack of discipline has somewhat create a problem.
Rules were made for an organized traffic system, however, people seems not to understand this
reason. The public road users do not take this rules as a basis for safety and convenience but a
hindrance to their errands. They cannot wait so they speed up, they did not want to walk in the
pedestrian lane instead they jay-walked. This attitude amongst Filipinos often led to unwanted
accidents. This accidents create a chokepoint, limiting the flow of the traffic.
Water mobility, which includes ports that houseboats and vessels, was one of the most
crucial sub-sectors of the transportation system. Ports perform a significant role in economic
development since they host social activities such as trading. As our nation's biggest economic
provider, it is only reasonable that we maintain basic amenities. Our ports, on the contrary,
were affirmed in an Asian Development Bank assessment as having a horrendous safety
reputation. Human error, force majeure, and a lack of vessel management were all factors in the
annual tally of 160 marine catastrophes. The human mistake was to be responsible for the
majority of the mishaps, in the sense that we cannot provide these vessels and boats safe

Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam

Name: Recil Marie D. Boragay Professor: Engr. Ryan S. Guevarra
Year and Course: 3rd Year BS Civil Engineering Block: B

storage. Last 2020 the Manila ports were feared to shut down due to congestion. The sole reason
of this problem was due to poor yard management.
Our ports were saturated owing to the inflow of commodities on June 15, 2021, and they
had already surpassed their maximum capacity. It is clear from this circumstance that we were
not equipped for the surge in imports. Despite the fact that many ports have been built in recent
years, the issue that our country's key ports have limited yard area made no impact. Ports that
are being built must account for the potential of a greater spike in imports than is now the case.
To ensure that port congestion is averted in a reasonable timeframe, the government must
provide a wider area for both storage and maintenance. Congestion reduces the efficiency of
the influx and circulation of cash flow in our country, which is why it must be rectified as soon
as possible.
There were also significant improvements that can be seen in our water transportation.
The roll-on, roll-off (ro-ro) ferry services become the alternative in the interisland shipping
services. There have been policies existing up until today which actually increased the
productivity of the ro-ro. Here are the good result: (i) goods are being shipped more efficiently,
(ii) transport costs have been reduced, (iii) new interisland and regional links are being created,
(iv) regional markets have expanded, (v)  tourism has benefited, (vi)  local area development is
being accelerated, (vii) logistics practices are changing, and (viii) the domestic shipping industry
is restructuring and becoming more competitive. You see if transportation were given the same
amount of attention the economy of our country would probably rise more than what we have
expected. Therefore, ports must have been prioritized, including rehabilitation and maintenance.
In some areas whose becoming tourist destinations, the construction and development must be
planned out any time soon enable to become safe and accessible to the public, especially
nowadays that our economic status is fleeting and the recovery is far from reach. Even though it
is not open for all, at least there is a limited number of people who can somehow lift the
dropping economy.
Air transport on the other hand had been liberalized since 1992. In fact, there were 215
airports that are operating in the Philippines. Eighty-three were owned by the government and
the rest were privately owned. Air transport in the Philippines makes also a great contribution to
our growing economy. It is stated in the introduction that our country is an archipelago, it is
located in a most convenient place wherein tourists could enjoy various destinations whether on
land or in the sea. Most of our tourists traveled miles in order to see a majestic view here in the
Philippines. To ensure that they would go back on their vacation, our country should leave a
good impression. It will start with the facilities and services of the airports. Recently, the Ninoy
Aquino International Airport had been criticized due to its poor service to travelers. Based on
what I have read in the reviews, the immigrants were really uptight. It is chaotic as one of them
describes.
From what I can conclude from all the research that I have done I can say is that the
government is solely focused on construction but lacks the budget for rehabilitation,
improvement, and sustainability. Infrastructure does not only rely on quantity but also always
prioritized quality. Although there were trained and talented Engineers, they could not maximize
their potential because of certainties of involvement of those in position. Oftentimes these people
use this field to feed their greed that taints the field of engineering. Engineers should have been
the epitome of progress, not a stature of corruption. They have the ability to turn the situation
from a dystopian to a utopian world which the government must-see. Entrust all the plans to
them and let them lead the way, their licenses is a valid proof that they were capable of doing
something new and something great for our nation.

Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam

 University of Nueva Caceres
College of Engineering and Architecture
S/Y 2022-2023

TRANSPORTATION ENGINEERING

PROBLEMS IN TRANSPORTATION
ENGINEERING

Submitted by:
Recil Marie D. Boragay
Student

Submitted to:
Engr. Ryan S. Guevarra
Instructor