"Maynilads Grand Plan: Broken Roads for all"

"Maynilads Grand Plan: Broken Roads for all"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr. 

Thanks to the wonderful Maynilad excavations that have been ongoing all summer long one of the busiest streets in our area has become a veritable Abortion Road and Bane to sensitive Scrotums. Every few feet you would literally fall into inches deep horizontal cuts into the ground. Every few feet you bounce around and hit your head on the low ceiling of the tricycles that are the main form of transport here.

So why the long hold up in covering these nuances? No one seems to hold the answers. So every day all sorts of motorized vehicles have their shock absorbers put to the test , people who normally dont have those are also put to the test. It is a bumpy ride in the least , a head thumping , dizzying , slow ride at its worst. And traffic does slow down to a crawl at certain times of the day. Even better is the ever changing placement of barricades , if those things cause such a traffic in a wide road like EDSA , imagine what it does to a 2 way side road. You get Commuters grumbling , you have tricycle drivers shouting at each other. Fights have broken out but not so much that anybody dies. Still why wait till it reaches that point right? why not just go back and fix the damn things?

Over the Holy Week , a pipe burst and because it was a holiday it took quite a while for Maynilad to respond. A whole day. I imagined that they had to drag someone from a long deserved drinking spree somewhere to fix those damaged pipes. In the time it took them to send someone over though , some kids have taken to the streets and enjoyed in the cascading waters. The waters that pooled at the bottom of our street was used to clean tricycles and water plants and stored for later use. It was free water. The kids loved the water fall. I on the other can only shake my head as I look at the equipments that have been left , the barricades and endless broken roads. 

The rains recently have not been so kind , the only thing that was done to make the roads even was to put some sand or gravel on them. Those dont last very much and they are carried off with each passing wheel until you have a hole that could threaten your tires or your sanity. Low riding Tricycles have had so many troubles. It is just really puzzling that they break up roads in so many places and then just leave it open? So it is either someone in Maynila has some stake in the Shock Absorber market or their grand plan is not actually to fix pipes but provide broken Roads for everyone.Seems like it.

In the meantime the pregnant ones and those with sensitive scrotums beware. It will still be a bumpy ride.