NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo When President Rodrigo Roa Duterte promised to ease Metro Manila traffic at the start of his term, he meant every word. At the onset, he tasked Department of Public Works and Highways Secretary Mark Villar to build a master plan that will connect all the cities in...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo According to World Health Organization (WHO), approximately 1.35 million people die each year as a result of road traffic crashes while at least 20 million more people suffer non-fatal injuries, with many incurring a disability as a result. More than half of all...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo When the construction of Mindanao Avenue Extension started, Melvin Navarro was a fresh graduate from college. Year after year — he would pass by the same alignment, which if completed would connect North Caloocan to both the North Luzon Expressway and Quezon City....
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo A total of 939.38 km of High-Standard Highways/Expressways are targeted to be implemented/constructed in Luzon, which is about twice the 382.26 km of existing expressways. Once completed, the travel time from Metro Manila to La Union will be reduced from six hours...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo While attending the 6th ASEAN Connectivity Forum in Seoul, I learned that during the 1960s, the Philippines had the second highest per capita income in Asia, behind only Japan. A decade after, South Korea had passed our country in per capita income terms, largely...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo Critics of the administration recently pointed out that over 180,000 families will be displaced in Metro Manila should the NLEX-SLEX Connector Road Project and the North-South Commuter Railway (NSCR) Project push through. This claim is fictitious, inaccurate, and...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo For 17 days, I travelled with 20 people from 14 different countries to five different states in America as part of the US Department of State’s International Visitors Leadership Program (IVLP). The first time I met them — we were at the lobby of DC Churchill...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo Under the administration of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte, Department of Public Works and Highways Secretary Mark Villar noted that the agency has built a total of 3,945 km of roads. DPWH has widened 1,908 km of roads, built 328 kilometer of bypasses and diversion...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo According to the World Risk Report, inadequate and inefficient infrastructure and weak logistic networks significantly increase the risk for an extreme natural hazard to backslide into a disaster. Philippines lies along the Pacific Typhoon Belt and is within the...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo On September 3, I met 20 people from 14 different countries at the lobby of DC Churchill Hotel — a 112-year-old historic infrastructure which has come to be a landmark on Connecticut Avenue in Waswhington, DC. Apart from the 50-year elevator, the eight-story...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo Last week, I was invited to speak and award the Ten Outstanding Students of the Philippines-Calabarzon Regional Awardees. I could still remember how a few years back, we found ourselves sitting at the same chair, anxiously waiting for our name to be...
NIGHT OWL Anna Mae Yu Lamentillo Out of the 171 countries assessed in the 2016 World Risk Report, the Philippines ranked 3rd most exposed to natural hazards. According to PAGASA, the Philippines is visited by at least 20 tropical cyclones every year. Just last week, heavy rains brought about by...
