QUEZON City Mayor Herbert Bautista on Monday closed down the Dimple Star Transport bus terminal located in Epifanio delos Santos Avenue in Cubao.
Bautista personally served the closure order at the bus terminal at 11 a.m.
“About a year ago today, we signed a memorandum of agreement with the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority and Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board that served as a warning to bus operators to shape up or ship out. The time has come to wield the big stick,” he said.
The terminal’s closure came after President Rodrigo Duterte ordered the cancellation of the franchise of the bus line when one of its buses plunged into a ravine in Mindoro Occidental.
At least 19 people were killed and 21 others were injured in the incident.
Bautista also led a composite team from the city hall to check the other terminals in Cubao.
“We don’t want another tragedy to happen. Both the national and local governments have been trying to implement measures to minimize the risks on the road. The public should also do its share by not patronizing colorum and non-compliant buses,” he said.
Garry Domingo, Business Permits and Licensing Office chief, said the city government issues a different business permit for bus terminals and garages.
“A terminal cannot operate as a garage and vice versa. We’ve been getting complaints against bus terminals and Mayor Bautista has ordered us not to tolerate this irregularity,” he said.
Meanwhile, authorities has the campaign against colorum buses and out of line public utility vehicles in response to the directive of President Duterte.
“The President made it clear. We need to address and finally resolve the colorum problem that is plaguing our public transport system” said Thomas Orbos, head of the Inter-Agency Council on Traffic.
Orbos was referring to the order of President Duterte when he visited the victims of road accident in Occidental Mindoro involving the Dimple Star bus line.
Separate operations were conducted in various bus terminals along Epifanio de los Santos Avenue, particularly in the area of Cubao in Quezon City and in the cities of Pasay and Caloocan.
During the operation, public utility bus Joanna Jesh was flagged down on Edsa for violating the close-door-policy. Upon inspection, the I-ACT team found out that the bus was operating with fake registration plate and expired official receipt and certificate of registration, and tampered its engine number.
I-ACT is a special task force of the government composed of personnel from the Metro Manila Development Authority, Department of Transportation, Police Highway Patrol Group, Land Transportation Office, Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board, and local government unit traffic officers.
Meanwhile, the I-ACT thru the LTFRB is formulating a comprehensive guidelines and immediate plan of action to get rid of colorum and out-of-line vehicles. The agency holds all data on all franchised public land transport.
The LTFRB earlier suspended the operations of Dimple Star's entire fleet consisting of 118 buses for one month because of various violations.
But despite the suspension order, the said bus company still allowed five buses to run and operate last Friday.
“We had to go to its terminal to make sure that the order be complied with. It seems this company normally breaks regulations as part of its normal operations. Around May of last year, when I was an officer-in-charge of MMDA, I already ordered the closure of its terminal in Quezon City,” said Orbos.
“For some reason it was reopened sometime this year by the local government with the promise it would improve its facilities. It seems it reneged on that too,” he added.
Aside from setting the guidelines and plan of action, I-ACT intends to set the protocol for all anti-colorum operations and remind all agencies that all operations must be coordinated and cleared with the LTFRB being the lead and regulatory agency in public land transport.
A motor vehicle is considered operating as “colorum” under any of the following circumstances: a private motor vehicle operating as a PUV but without proper authority from the LTFRB; a PUV operating outside of its approved route or area without a prior permit from the Board or outside the exceptions provided under existing memorandum circulars; a PUV operating differently from its authorized denomination (ex. Those approved as school service but operating as UV express, or those approved as tourist bus transport but operating as city or provincial bus) and a PUV with suspended or cancelled CPC and the Decision/Order of suspension or cancellation is executor and a PUV with expired CPC and without a pending application for extension of validity timely filed before the Board.
“We must be relentless in our campaign against colorum and road-unworthy PUVs to prevent fatal road accidents. But we also need the cooperation of the transport sector, for them to comply and abide the laws” Orbos emphasized.
President Duterte has ordered a crackdown on all colorum vehicles nationwide, including arresting their drivers and operators, after visiting the families of the victims of the recent bus accident.
“I told the police, the highway patrol to find the operators and jail them also. If you resist arrest and the lives of the police were in danger, my order to them was to kill you,” Duterte said.
Orbos said the government is determined not only to minimize, but to put a stop to the traffic problems caused by colorum vehicles, which if left unattended, will further cause more headaches to the general public and the authorities.
Authorities admitted that colorums are among the “culprits” that causes heavy traffic.
Under a Joint Administrative Order issued by the LTO and LTFRB, operators of colorum buses will be fined P1 million for the first offense, P200,000 for trucks and vans, P120,000 for sedans, P50,000 for jeepneys, and P60,000 for motorcycles.
But according to former MMDA chairman and now Marikina City Rep. Bayani Fernando, the burning of colorum vehicles is one of the solutions to address the worsening traffic problem.
Fernando, vice chairman of the House Committee on Transportation, had urged the government to rationalize the issuance of franchise to all public utility vehicles.
“All PUVs must be given franchise, the jeeps, buses and UV Express. The truth is we lack in public utility vehicles, but the problem is dispatching, and that is why we created the organized bus routed dispatching. The secret of all transport companies is the effective dispatching,” said Fernando.
Upon issuance of franchise, Fernando said, “You will no longer become colorum. But first strike, your vehicle will be burned and from there, you will get another franchise before you can get a [new] unit.”
He explained that “If you did not burn it, they will keep coming back. You have the right to own but you should not use it. As I see it the problems keep coming back. Iyung mga bus nanunuhol. Nakakasawa na. Ang bait kasi natin.”
The MMDA is mandated under Republic Act 7924, the law creating the agency, to go after colorum and out-of-line vehicles.