BAGUIO CITY — A Baguio City councilor is pushing for a measure to make tourists with vehicles pay before entering the city.
This, as City Councilor Leandro Yangot Jr. stressed that the number of vehicles entering the Summer Capital of the Philippines is just adding to the traffic woes of the city.
Yangot is seeking to pass an ordinance imposing a congestion fee to all tourists bringing their private vehicles into the City of Pines. Yangot is moving that all visiting vehicle owners or drivers shall pay P50 upon entry to the city.
Baguio residents, on the other hand, will be exempted from paying the congestion fee.
The councilman said that one of the amendments he might introduce in the later version of the proposal is the exemption of citizens from the La Trinidad-Itogon-Sablan-Tuba-Tublay areas or even from all parts of the Cordillera region.
He added that the measure aims to help in reducing the worsening traffic problem in the city. Yangot stressed that traffic is one of the biggest headaches of the city, stressing that imposing a congestion fee is one way to regulate the entry of visitor cars to the city.
Yangot also pointed out that all collected fees shall be deposited in a trust fund to be used for programs and activities to mitigate traffic congestion in the city.
The City Treasury Office shall be tasked to formulate the guidelines and to monitor the implementation of the ordinance.