More Metro residents plead: Spare our homes from subway

More residents and businesses are resisting dislocation by a Metro Manila north-south subway. Petitions have been filed against demolition of their homes and shops. Stations are to be built on or beside their subdivisions, along Katipunan, Quezon City, to Food Terminal Inc., Taguig. Expropriation and resettlement can swell the project cost to six times the annual national outlay for transportation.

In Parañaque City, south side of the capital, dwellers beg planners to stop their being overrun by the rail route. Officials in north-side Quezon City and Caloocan earlier had asked for consultations with communities through and under which trains will run.

Parañaque folk oppose a suddenly announced “Bicutan station” that would require their eviction. Neighbors in Makati South Hills and along East Service Road, Manga to Molave Streets, point to alternative sites: C-5 to Cucumber Road, and government lots nearby. “That should be prioritized [than] forcibly taking our private property.”

Homeowners in adjacent United Hills Village have sent Transport Sec. Arthur Tugade a “vehement objection”. The subway project “should not be at the expense of taking our homes and dislocating families, which is confiscatory,” they wrote. “We are not informal settlers. We acquired and built our homes by the sweat of our brows. These are of heavy-duty materials.” Relocation would disrupt their work and schooling. Copy-furnished Executive Sec. Salvador Medialdea, they too identified other locations for a depot: a vacant land once occupied by Gelmart Industries, and areas inside vast Food Terminal Inc., Taguig, the end-station’s original site a kilometer away.

Usec. for Railways Timothy John Batan has met with some of them. Onsite technical inspection was set last Wed.

Houses and stores in United Parañaque Subd.-2 and Malugay area supposedly would be affected. Station construction and operation means pollution, noise, and earth vibration.

All are in Barangay San Martin de Porres. Tarps have been put up proclaiming, “No to expropriation for subway project!” and “United we stand! No to FTI subway incursion of our homes!”

Residents want a city council hearing under the Local Government Code. Barangay chairman Atty. Michael Thor Singson has endorsed their position paper to Vice Mayor Enrico Golez, thru Councilors Giovanni Esplana and Edwin Benzon. Copies were given Mayor Edwin Olivarez, Congresswoman Joy Tambunting, and Congressman Eric Olivarez.

In Quezon City as far back as June, Councilor Victor Ferrer also has sought delay of subway biddings until the council holds its own hearings. Only barangay-level meetings were held on a project that will have seven stations in that city, he said. All 37 council members from all districts must determine if residents and businesses truly would benefit.

The 36-km subway previously was announced to have 15 stations: Quirino Highway-Mindanao Avenue, Tandang Sora, North Avenue, Quezon Boulevard, East Avenue, Anonas, and Katipunan in Quezon City; Ortigas North and Ortigas South in Pasig; Kalayaan in Makati; Bonifacio Global City, Lawton East, Lawton West, and FTI in Taguig; and NAIA-3 in Pasay. (None in Parañaque)

Ferrer feared adverse effects on residential and commercial property values, and consequently tax takes, along the alignment of the first three stations. Groundbreaking began there in Feb. Congressman Edgar Erice, near whose Caloocan City boundary the north depot will be, also expressed misgivings.

Reports then were that the Katipunan station will be on Camp Aguinaldo land, headquarters of the Armed Forces. Around it are quiet gated subdivisions: White Plains, Corinthian Gardens, Corinthian Hills, and Green Meadows.

Recompensing and relocating residents and businesses would delay construction and raise costs from the present P356.96 billion. When a subway was first approved in Aug. 2016, official documents show, the annual fund for transport works nationwide was only one-sixth, or P60 billion. Japan is to lend P52.25 billion for the subterranean works.

Experts at the time considered three alignments: along EDSA to augment MRT-3, in Greenhills along C-3, and Mandaluyong.

Two months later Mandaluyong was replaced by the present “Katipunan option”. Japanese and Filipino technologists found Katipunan least advantageous, based on cost, environmental, and geological studies. The underground tracks would cross the West Valley Fault Line, making it vulnerable to earthquake and liquefaction. Based on 2009’s Super Storm Ondoy, the alignment is also prone to floods.

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Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto: “If the DND Secretary was left clueless about the China Telecom-AFP deal in his own backyard, then maybe it is time to install a radar system in his office. If this deal can fly stealthily under the nose of the man responsible for our nation’s defense, then it raises anew the vulnerability of our borders from intruders. Allowing a Chinese telco to install towers inside our military camps should have been cleared at the highest level due to its security implications. The concern that these could morph into embedded listening devices, and that the project is like letting an electronic Trojan horse into our camps, should have been subjected to third-party expert study.”

In America the top Democrat senator is warning that new subway cars for New York by a China state firm could pose national security threats. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has asked the US Commerce Department to look into potential cyber-espionage and sabotage. China Railway and Railcar Co. won a recent design contest to modernize NYC’s subway trains. It has not won any contract in that city, but equips Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, and Philadelphia. CRRC offers to invest $50 million to develop “new train control technology,” which Schumer said needs “top-to-bottom review”.

US President Donald Trump’s trade talks with China collapsed when his administration barred American tech firms from supplying any more suspicious Chinese counterparts. Two Chinese laws compel companies and citizens to assist in intelligence gathering.

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