Huli ka!

Here's a pic of the Guadalupe bridge, before and after they removed the provincial bus stop.
Sino naman ang engot na nagisip na maglagay ng bus stop sa tulay? Siguro natanggal na sa trabaho 'yun.

FAIL!

Hahahaha! Always wanted to say that. =)

Hindi pa pala patay yung provincial bus stop project. Here's a shot of the one in front of Megamall, taken last night. Looks like it'll eat up one of the non-yellow lanes.

Recently noticed that the provincial bus stop on the Guadalupe bridge has disappeared. So what happened? Not that we're complaining. It was a really stupid idea to begin with.

Anyway, here's a shot of the one at Guadalupe taken last December 6. Hope they do disappear permanently.

The MMDA has announced that it will set up 13 new bus stops on EDSA for the exclusive use of provincial buses. This was prompted by findings showing that the sharing of bus stops by both metro and provincial buses are a major cause of traffic congestion.

Oh no! This means that there will be 13 more spots where you can expect traffic on the already highly congested thoroughfare. Anyway, aren't provincial buses only allowed to load and unload passengers on their bus terminals? This is why they're not supposed to use the yellow lanes, right?

In spite of the numerous MMDA enforcers stationed near Mantrade, they still can't do anything about the buses loading and unloading just after the bay station.
Unless they're willing to force the buses (and the commuters) to use the bay stations, they should just get rid of them.

Here's another example of the ineffectivity of the MMDA's loading and unloading station. This time it's the Buendia-EDSA southbound one.

The commuters coming from Buendia usually wait right underneath the flyover 'cos the station is too far and there's no protection from the rains on the long walk to the station. Of course, passengers alighting from the buses also prefer to go down here.
So what's the MMDA going to do about this?

Here's my analysis of the faults of the MMDA's loading and unloading stations, using pics of the Santolan-EDSA northbound station from yesterday and today.

First, during rush hours, when private vehicles freely use the yellow lanes 'cos of the large volume of vehicles, more traffic is caused when these vehicles merge with the third lane to avoid going into the stations.
Next, since most commuters would want to avoid the long walk to and from the stations (most of these are quite a ways off from the intersections where they come from), the buses end up loading and unloading passengers after the station.Lastly, these buses now try to merge back into the non-yellow lanes in order for them to avoid the stoplight at the ground level (typical on EDSA northbound), causing more traffic on the lanes leading to the flyover and blocking the vehicles heading towards the ground level intersection.So, at this point, I don't really think it helps reduce traffic. In fact, it probably adds to it.

Now, if the MMDA somehow manages to force these buses to load and unload only at the stations, then that's when these stations will be an advantage. Well, except for the part where the private vehicles on the yellow lanes forcibly merge back to avoid them. Parang walang solusyon 'ata para d'yan.

Talagang iniiwasan ng mga bus dumaan sa mga 'to. Here are a few pics:

Are these things really helping reduce traffic on EDSA?
The buses try to avoid them for some reason. And commuters think they're too far and prefer waiting near the intersections. And don't even get me started on those yellow lane-passing cars that swerve to avoid these at the last minute.

If the traffic enforcers do their jobs and force the buses to use these stations, then maybe, just maybe, it'll improve things. But at the rate things are going, malabong-malabo 'yon.