Manila bus rapid transit scheme eyed

MANILA, Philippines–The Department of Transportation and Communications is eyeing a bus rapid transit  (BRT) system for Metro Manila, which would be the second project of this type announced in the country after Cebu.

DOTC, in a published notice, said it is seeking bidders to prepare a detailed engineering design for the Manila Bus Rapid Transit System.

The project calls for a BRT system, which typically involves a dedicated lane with specific bus stations, to operate along the Quirino Highway-to-Manila City Hall route.

The DOTC said the project should be completed by 2018, which would allow it serve about 279,500 passengers per day using 300 buses. It added that 32 stations were being planned and that waiting times should be limited to two to five minutes.

“The identified corridor is a main strategic transport route cutting diagonally through the upper half of Metro Manila,” the DOTC said. “It is a route that is not currently served by any form of mass transit.”

“The corridors’ strategic importance and its connections with the Light Rail Transit Line 1, Metro Rail Transit Line 3 and Philippine National Railways, together with its high volume of travel, make it a vital mass transit route,” the department added.

The DOTC said interested consultants should have completed at least two similar contracts in the last five years. They should also have experience in consulting in construction design for the last 10 years, the department added.

Interested groups would have until Feb. 19 this year to submit their “expressions of interest” in the project, the DOTC said.

As noted, this is the second BRT project announced by the DOTC. Last year, the department said they are eyeing to bid out a P10.6-billion BRT system in Cebu that would run along a 23-kilometer corridor.

Bidding for the project was set for the middle of 2015.

Although the first BRT-style system was operated in Curitiba, Brazil in 1974, it was popularized only in 2000 by the Transmilenio BRT system in Bogota, Colombia, which was a centerpiece achievement of its then-mayor, Enrique Peñalosa.