Category Archives: Academe

By Dean Tony La Viña, http://manilastandardtoday.com

In my last column, I introduced candidates and winners of the Inclusive Mobility Challenge whose advocacy centered around bicycles. Here, I tackle the three remaining notable candidates, one of whom bagged the Challenge’s Grand Prize, each of which offers a different service that’s wholly lacking in the greater picture of Metro Manila urban mobility.

Throughout this column’s discussion of inclusive mobility, I have described cars as an inefficient mode of mobility, compared to a well-thought out system of buses and trains, pedestrian and bike lanes, and even jeeps and trikes (where and when they can be efficiently used and integrated into the inclusive mobility network). But until government and society can build up alternative, public-use mobility as a competitive alternative to private vehicle use, and I argue even when we have such alternatives, we must also take steps to reform the use of the car – make it a more efficient use of fuel and space by maximizing its passenger carriage: the carpool.

By Dean Tony La Viña, http://manilastandardtoday.com

In my last column on inclusive mobility, published a few weeks ago, I focused on the virtues of Guangzhou’s integrated bus rapid transit, bike-sharing, pedestrian-friendly infrastructure, especially in comparison to local experience. Clearly, inclusive mobility needs government to reform and revamp public transportation and road/land use policy. Mobility however is not a service that is solely provided by government—or by big business, for that matter. Just as the system can accommodate passengers and pedestrians of any age, gender, economic status, or physical ability, so should inclusive mobility accommodate service providers apart from large-scale players like government and transport companies, encouraging entrepreneurship and innovation closer to the ground and the end-user.

This was what the Inclusive Mobility Challenge, whose awards were handed out last September 21, was about: encouraging entrepreneurs and innovators to develop proposals, especially those which can improve the mobility (or access to mobility) of those who need it the most: the poor, the elderly and the disabled, women and children. In today’s Metro Manila, their mobility is hampered by unsafe roads, inconvenient public transport, and the lack of safe pedestrian and bike lanes, and disabled-friendly infrastructure (e.g., wheelchair ramps or elevators). These proposals, depending on their objectives, had to meet criteria of accessibility by the end user, especially the marginalized; affordability on a budget; and environmental impact—emphasizing the Challenge’s objective of promoting “mobility of all, for all, by all.”

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