E-Trike Issues
Beginning April 15, drivers of e-vehicles like e-trikes and e-bikes caught
on 19 major thoroughfares, including national, circumferential, and radial
roads of Metro Manila, will be apprehended and penalized.
WHERE E-TRIKES ARE BANNED:
C1: Recto Avenue
C2: Pres. Quirino Avenue
C3: Araneta Avenue
C4: EDSA
C5: Katipunan/CP Garcia
C6: Southeast Metro Manila Expressway
R1: Roxas Boulevard
R2: Taft Avenue
R3: SLEX
R4: Shaw Boulevard
R5: Ortigas Avenue
R6: Magsaysay Blvd./Aurora Blvd.
R7: Quezon Ave./Commonwealth Ave.
R8: A. Bonifacio Ave.
R9: Rizal Ave.
R10: Del Pan/Marcos Highway/McArthur Highway
Elliptical Road
Mindanao Avenue
Marcos Highway
Also prohibited on these thoroughfares by MMDA Resolution No. 24-022
series of 2024 are tricycles, pedicabs, pushcarts, and kuligligs.
The e-trikes and e-bikes will also be impounded if their drivers are found
to have no driver's licenses.
This is an indication that authorities will be moving to mandate that
e-trikes can only be driven by licensed drivers.
Sellers and distributors have been marketing the e-trikes as modes of
transport that need no licenses to operate on the road.
The MMDA resolution also directed local government units to issue
ordinances regulating the use of e-trikes in respective jurisdictions,
including identifying roads where these are prohibited.
The MMDA and the Metro Manila Council composed of mayors of the
municipality and cities making up the National Capital Region cited the
many accidents caused by e-trikes on roads, the chaos and congestion on the
streets they exacerbate with their unruly drivers who ignore all traffic
regulations as reasons for implementing the ban.
Even as the ban is set to be implemented, many are still arguing against
its implementation.
The Move as One Coalition, advocates for safer, more humane, and more
inclusive public transportation in the Philippines, questioned the
government's contention that e-trike caused many accidents.
They cited MMDA's own Metro Manila Accidents Reporting and Analysis System
findings that in 2022, bikes/e-bikes/pedicabs were only involved in 2.05
percent of road accidents in the metropolis, 4.84 percent of accidents with
fatalities, and 5.88 percent of accidents non-fatal injuries.
In contrast, the MMARAS reported that 52.48 percent of road accidents
involved private cars, and 22.59 percent involved motorcycles.
The question implied: Why ban e-trikes when more accidents are caused by
private cars and motorcycles?
But viral videos of e-trikes going against the flow of traffic, stopping in
the middle of yellow boxes at lighted intersections, being driven by
pre-teens gives one pause that perhaps a strict implementation of the ban
is needed.
And some can argue that any number of accidents, any number of fatalities
or injuries, or damage to property can never be too small not to do
something to prevent them.
Others however take a bigger view from the issue.
Ira Cruz, director of AltMobility PH, advocates of sustainable and
inclusive transport, says the popularity of e-trikes is a manifestation of
government's failure to answer the basic needs of ordinary Filipinos for
mobility.
Cruz asserts that it is unacceptable for government to focus its energy on
restrictions rather than solutions.
The Move as One Coalition and AltMobility PH both believe that e-bikes and
e-trikes could help the country meet its environmental objectives.
AltMobility PH's Cruz is urging the President to direct national government
agencies to act together to address the mobility problems of people.
Perhaps advocates for sustainable and inclusive mobility such as Move as
One Coalition and AltMobility PH can also address on of the main issues
that brought about the ban from major thoroughfares is the ill-discipline
of those who use them or their ignorance of or just refusal to obey basic
road traffic regulations.