CEBU CITY, Philippines — The Department of Transportation (DOTr) has begun the plans for an Integrated Intermodal Transport System (IITS) in Metro Cebu with the monorail as its backbone.

DOTr Undersecretary Mark Richmond De Leon came to Cebu on June 11 to meet with the officials from the agencies which would be working together for the new transport system in Cebu.

Eduardo Montealto, Jr., Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board in Central Visayas (LTFRB-7) director; Victor Caindec, Land Transportation Office in Central Visayas (LTO-7) director; and Edgar Tabacon, Department of Public Works and Highways in Central Visayas (DPWH-7) director; all expressed support to the IITS.

Aside from the monorail, the DOTr plans to implement bikeways, intermodal terminals, park and drive facilities, and walkways as part of IITS.

“We are not looking for a single solution to address traffic congestion as we all know there is no single bullet for this problem of congestion, it should be a basket of solutions,” De Leon said.

The Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system would still be part of IITS, and De Leon said the project was expected to be completed before the end of the President Rodrigo Duterte’s term.

Read more: Proposed monorail project for Cebu gets exec’s support

Secretary Michael Lloyd Dino, Presidential Assistant to the Visayas, who recently expressed his support to the monorail project, also met with De Leon and Eymard Eje, the DOTr Assistant Secretary for rails, to discuss updates on the projects.

Eje was able to share his inputs based on his experience from the upcoming Mindanao Railway Project.

Dino said that he would push for an urban realm development to modernize the Cebuanos’ mobility in line with the vision of President Rodrigo Duterte for an infrastructure boom in Cebu.

He said the meeting for IITS had been successful and he was expecting that the project would soon be realized in the coming years. /dbs