If not the BRT, what?

It seems the Cebu Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) will never run out of antagonists. The way I look at it, it may never. I believe it’s not as if people see anything inherently bad about it. It just doesn’t seem to compare to the rail system which we knew since we were young. Even if there were already quite a number of running systems, naysayers still abound. Wikipedia had this latest count: “As of March 2018, a total of 166 cities in six continents have implemented BRT systems, accounting for 4,906 km (3,048 mi) of BRT lanes and about 32.2 million passengers every day.”

I have already written years ago about the BRT’s unfortunate plight of being a latecomer. The novelty of rail had always hounded us since we were young, especially for the men. Boys will be boys and who wouldn’t want a toy train for Christmas or your birthday. I doubt there’s anyone out there who asked his father for a toy bus. When my son was young, I always gifted him with running choo-choo toy trains, complete with a train station. Or toy cars. Never a toy bus.

So, when someone proposes a BRT as a mode of public transportation, eyebrows are raised in apparent bewilderment. What, a bus? Sure, we have buses all the time --when we travel to the province or to other provinces. But in the city? Even in Manila, many prefer their LRT or MRT, save for a few. So here in our city, there will always remain sectors that have their pent-up disdain for the Cebu BRT. Why a BRT? Why not a train? It doesn’t even matter what kind it will be --MRT, LRT, monorail … I’ve heard of even strange contraptions which offer “pods” that can carry passengers up in the sky.

The sad part is people don’t even consider the financial and economic figures these different transport modes produce. Fortunately for the country, NEDA is very keen on making the right decisions, based on the correct measures of economic viability --primarily the Economic Internal Rate of Return (EIRR) and secondarily the Financial Internal Rate of Return (FIRR). That’s why many of those trainspotters or railway buffs refuse to understand that the BRT will almost always register a higher viability than any train system. You can always get any feasibility studies of both and compare. Better still if it’s the same corridor which will offer a direct comparison. The BRT, pound for pound, will almost always beat any rail equivalent, up to a certain level of ridership. Certain conditions or considerations might shift the preferability to the other side. Certain ridership figures may require the capacity of rail. But until that is breached, the BRT may be able to offer a more economically viable solution to mobility.

For the Cebu BRT, the problem is the alternative. It will take another 10 to 15 years of project development. There’s a monorail pending in NEDA, but it suffers from the same impediment I wrote above --lack of viability. So, what’s your alternative --wait for another decade? It’s up to you. Me? I can always walk or bike anytime.

"The sad part is people don’t even consider the financial and economic figures these different transport modes produce."