Categories: Client News

Open Letter to President Duterte: Traffic Congestion is Our Shared Enemy

<p><strong>Uber is a &num;PartnerforChange in President Duterte’s &num;100daychallenge<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Dear President Duterte&comma;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In your State of the Nation address&comma; you zeroed in on solving traffic as one of your highest priorities&period; Here at Uber&comma; we agree&comma; and want to be part of your &num;100DayChallenge against our shared enemy&colon; Traffic Congestion&period;<&excl;--more--><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Traffic congestion is a complicated problem&comma; and there’s no single solution&period; But thanks to technology&comma; Uber can give millions of riders in Metro Manila a viable alternative to private vehicle ownership&comma; and encourage those who have private vehicles to share them&comma; right now&comma; without any additional cost to taxpayers or the government&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>This may sound counterintuitive&comma; but we can actually cut congestion by rethinking the way we use cars&period; According to the Land Transportation Office&comma; there were more than 7 million private cars registered in the Philippines in 2014&comma; 1&period;4 million which were newly added to the road&period; Instead of having millions of trips happening with one person behind each wheel&comma; what if we could simply get more people into fewer cars&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Over 300&comma;000 riders rely on our service to get around the city&period; In a recent rider survey in Metro Manila&comma; 79&percnt; of riders had eliminated or reduced usage of their personal vehicles because of Uber&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In order to get &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;More People into Fewer Cars&comma;” we launched two new ridesharing products in 2016&colon; uberHOP&comma; which gets up to 6 riders from key business districts into a single car during rush hours&comma; and uberPOOL&comma; which lets up to 4 riders heading in the same direction share a single trip for a lower cost&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>If uberHOP riders had traveled separately&comma; they would have added more than 96&comma;000 kilometers to the road–equivalent to driving the entire length of the EDSA 4&comma;000 times&period; They would have also consumed over 7&comma;700 liters of gas&comma; and emitted over 18 metric tons of carbon dioxide&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>uberPOOL&comma; launched just 40 days ago&comma; is still in its infancy&comma; but has already saved about 75&comma;000 car-trips on the road by cutting more than 150&comma;000 trips in half through real-time matching of riders going towards the same destination in one car&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<div class&equals;"embedded-video"><iframe src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;youtube&period;com&sol;embed&sol;Beyx6uk&lowbar;LlA&quest;rel&equals;0" width&equals;"560" height&equals;"315" frameborder&equals;"0"><&sol;iframe><&sol;div>&NewLine;<p>This model works&comma; but outdated rules and complicated licensing requirements deter carpooling by making it too hard to share a ride&comma; effectively forcing citizens into individual car ownership–at a huge public cost&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Uber has always been committed to working towards compliance in partnership with the government&comma; as demonstrated by the submission of more than 23&comma;000 TNVS applications since regulations were passed last year&period; On average&comma; it has taken 106&period;82 days to receive a provisional authority&period; Only 31 certificates of public convenience have been issued to date&period; Which is why yesterday’s commitment to shortening processing times for applications is so important for addressing congestion as well as creating more economic opportunities for Filipinos&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>We are fully committed to working with the LTFRB to find a better solution&comma; but suspending new TNVS applications is at odds with the leadership position the Philippines has taken on ridesharing and goes against the spirit of the world’s first nationwide ridesharing regulations&period; It hurts everyday Filipinos and their families from making extra income while sharing their car&semi; it hurts everyday Filipino commuters who waste 4 hours a day on average in traffic&period; And it hampers the new administration’s ability to lead by example in embracing technology to tackle a really hard problem&colon; our common enemy of traffic congestion&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Let’s work together on this &num;100daychallenge to keep Manila moving&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Uber Philippines<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&num;WhyWeUber &num;PartnerforChange<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Source&colon; <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;newsroom&period;uber&period;com&sol;philippines&sol;open-letter-traffic-congestion-is-our-shared-enemy&sol;" target&equals;"&lowbar;blank" rel&equals;"noopener noreferrer">https&colon;&sol;&sol;newsroom&period;uber&period;com&sol;philippines&sol;open-letter-traffic-congestion-is-our-shared-enemy&sol;<&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;

J Darell Sapin

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