Biodiversity in the City presents

Birds in the city

http://www.birdwatch.ph/

If you look, you will see.

RCUBE presents Mapping Sustainable Pathways for a Safer and More Resilient Greater Manila Region

HAUNTED BY PLANS & PROJECTS PAST:Lessons for Rebuilding After Ondoy

Have you ever wondered why many "good" plans never make it to implementation? Do you want to find out why the Philippines is said to be good in planning, but bad in implementation?

Or, is it really true that the problem with Metro Manila or the Philippines in general is that "there is NO PLANNING?"

To find out, please join us on Monday, October 26, 2-5 PM as the Philippine Institute of Environmental Planners, together with the Ateneo School of Government present "Haunted by Plans and Projects Past: Lessons for Rebuilding After Ondoy"






Philippine Institute of Environmental Planners (PIEP), together with the Ateneo School of Government (ASoG) present "Haunted by Plans and Projects Past: Lessons for Rebuilding After Ondoy"

Date:	Monday, 26 October 2009
Time:	14:00 - 17:30
Location:	UP School of Urban and Regional Planning
Street:	E Jacinto Street, UP Diliman
Town/City:	Quezon City, Philippines

Please come, even if you are not a "planner." Especially if you are NOT a planner. Planning is too important to leave up to planners alone.

PIEP and ASoG invite you to a presentation of Metro Manila plans. Former DPWH Undersecretary Teodoro Encarnacion will share his memories of these plans and their outcome. A must listen for those who wish to move forward and not repeat the mistakes of the past.

"He who does not remember history is condemned to repeat it" - Georges Santayana

The PIEP is committed to letting the public in on how we could all benefit from planning processes (instead of looking at plans as static documents) to effectively bring us to a better future.

The MMETROPLAN MYSTERY

I am often asked about MMETROPLAN and if it holds the key to the mystery of why our dear Metropolis is this way today. I cannot claim to be an expert on it, and unfortunately I do not have much time to devote to reading every page of the 2-inch tome. (about 5 centimeters, but yes, "inches" sounds more poetic)

Behind these questions seem to be an underlying assumption that IF ONLY WE HAD FOLLOWED THE MMETROPLAN, a "blueprint" for development prepared in those good ol' days when Metro Manila was a mere fraction of its blightedness now, the recent tragedies brought about by typhoon Ondoy may not have been as severe.

If only it were that simple.

The MMETROPLAN (or at least the volume that I'm looking at) seems to be essentially a comprehensive transport plan for Metropolitan Manila, completed in 1977. It dedicates 32 pages of Urban Development recommendations, and a section on "Making sure that urban development takes place in areas which are suitable for development."

But it is on a map labeled "Areas Suitable for Development, 1977-1985," that it makes a strong statement regarding the Marikina Valley areas: RESTRICT URBAN EXPANSION UNTIL PROBLEMS RELATING TO FLOODING AND POLLUTION CAN BE RESOLVED.



I am glad that Arch. Palafox brought it up, if only to draw attention to the fact that at some point in our history (and indeed all throughout), there was analysis going on, there was planning going on, and great minds were at work to put together recommendations that were designed to ensure a better life for us all in our respective habitats. And that these processes were never taken seriously enough to act on them, but perhaps only seriously enough to fund them and then have the plans published in some form.

What I find worrisome is how there seems to be a notion that merely REVIVING THESE PLANS (including reviving the Paranaque Spillway project) is the key to ending our woes.

And as always, I am worried that all the blaming and finger-pointing will drain our energies and make us feel that we are doing something, when what we really should be doing is re-studying the areas that have been affected, taking into consideration all the changes and the new information, and move on from there.

The old plans are useful for the kind of information and clues they give us as to origins of certain things (especially their sections on analysis), and not for people to thump their chests to say, "see, we were right all along" and make everyone else wrong.

I am for accountability, and at this point let me just say that we, as citizens, are all accountable. At the same time, if we just go beyond the blaming and critically analyze how and where decisions were made and how the action moves forward, (and indeed, how plans are prepared, and their relationship to implementers) we might get somewhere.

People seem to have the impression that MMETROPLAN had a very complete guide to how the metropolis should develop, and had quite detailed locations of where to build and where not to build in the Marikina Valley. That would have been ideal.

But it only mentions general areas in the Marikina valley and beyond and went on to say that a more detailed feasibility study must be undertaken to determine specific areas that are suitable and unsuitable for development within those bigger localities.

As we now know, this did not happen.

MMETROPLAN does give policy directions and recommendations on guiding and controlling development, which again, unfortunately, were not picked up either by national or local government. And neither did the public learn about them.

And perhaps that is the clue to where we could improve on: establishing the links between planning and implementation, and between and among the plans that are being created here and there.

Perhaps, because MMETROPLAN was mostly a TRANSPORT PLAN as you will see in the Table of Contents of the Final Report, below, it was not circulated among non-transport people? Just wondering.



Another thng that is worrisome are the twin directions of merely relocating thousands of squatters OUTSIDE Metro Manila AND relying on technofixes, including the very expensive and quite useless approach of dredging.

If you think critically about these two megafixes, and imagine them undertaken without addressing more fundamental issues of over-development at the tops of watersheds, they will certainly pose more problems than they will solve.

Let me borrow from Darwin Fandino Flores' notes from the briefing by the Manila Observatory, U.P. National Institute of Geological Sciences and Jun Palafox last October 16, 2009. I have kept his comments in parentheses because they give life and specificity and therefore more power to the descriptions.


1. Areas are increasingly flood-prone as a result of:

1.1 subsidence due to groundwater extraction (too many deep-wells)
1.2 limited/inoperative drainage (basurang itinatapon sa mga estero at waterways, illegal structures)
1.3 limited absorptive capacity of urbanized areas (sinemento nang lahat ng pwedeng sementohin)
1.4 increased run-off from provincial high grounds due to deforestation (of surrounding
mountains/hills... naging mga subdivision na sila)
1.5 rising sea level due to climate change (ayan na!)

2. Overflowing of Laguna de Bay

2.1 siltation due to deforestation (of surrounding mountains and hills at saka mga basura)
2.2 limited egress to Manila Bay via Pasig River
2.3 limited egress via other channels (hinarangan ng mga subdivision at kung anu-ano pa)

3. Inadequate warning (walang effective local warning system)

Item 1 can still be rooted to the following:

1. overloading, overpopulation, and inbound migration (to Manila from the provinces);
2. inappropriate city configuration due to inappropriate city design and violation of zoning rules


I think it is a very good list. But I hope whoever's in charge of the solutions don't focus on 2.2 which they have tended to do all these years. 2.2 only justifies the very expensive and hard to measure "dredging" (and anything unmeasurable is prone to... you're right, corruption). Dredging is often too little, too late. Dredging means that you've already let the mountaintops dump their sedimentation down the river. That means that our authorities have not done anything to prevent erosion from happening further upstream.

Dredging only provides us a false sense of security that something is being done, when in fact it is about as effective as cutting off one's foot when clearly, a better diet and lifestyle would have prevented diabetes from resulting in complications.

I'd also be a little careful about citing "inbound migration." I think that's a knee-jerk reaction to justify "balik probinsya" programs even if there is no probinsya for people to return to. Most of the inhabitants of these settlements are home-grown. They have long ceased to remember how it is to live la vida agricultural, and in fact could be so urbanized that bringing them to the rural areas may only result in further degradation of natural ecosystems.

I could be wrong but I'd say the height of urban in-migration happened about a couple of generations ago. If I remember correctly, Metro Manila experienced a decrease in its growth rate about one or two censuses ago, with Region IV receiving much of its outmigration.

We might as well accept the reality that the people living in formal and informal relocation sites on hillsides and along waterways are at least two generations worth of Metro Manila informal settlers.

Consider this: in many of these communities, women have babies at age 14 or 15, and are grandmothers at 30. Many of them may even have babies every year. Since menopause is still far away, they can continue to have babies even through grandmotherhood.

Sure, we could address all of the above issues (and in fact we must), but if we don't address and provide support for people to effectively map out their family lives and indeed the rest of their earthly existence in such a way as to not unduly stress the environment upon which they rely on individually and collectively, we would continue to be wiped out again and again. And again.

We must find the courage to go beyond the usual and cliche solutions of "dredging, cementing and relocation" by working on our critical understanding of the real roots of Metro Manila's development problems.

And acting on them.



* Thanks to EnP Bituin Torte for generously lending her copy of the MMETROPLAN for my use.

Haunting Season

I came across "haunting" a few times in the past 24 hours, and figured that it is a theme that is worth writing about.

"Haunted" could very well be the most apt description for many Filipinos in the island of Luzon who are still grappling with the loss of life and property, their landscapes altered as radically as their lives.

On November 1, many of us will be trooping to cemeteries and memorial parks to celebrate family reunions that include our dear departed. Others, especially those whose loved ones perished in floods and landslides, may very well consider their former homes or settlements veritable interment grounds.

I find it funny that the two starkest uses of "haunting" that I came across last night had to do with the spirits/ghosts of Baguio City that a Facebook contact had been trying to write about, and a short film another friend had been wanting to shoot for a few months now.

I have no idea what the first was about, but I immediately thought of spirits haunting Baguio because of the havoc that humans have repeatedly wreaked upon it. If there was any place so beloved in the wrongest of ways, it must be Baguio City.

How do humans love thee, Baguio City? Let me count the ways. They have cut down your trees to build houses and malls. They have polluted the air with vehicles to ferry people who refuse to use their feet to navigate your undulating, beautiful curvaceous hills. They have quarried and scoured the earth to flatten you and make way for roads and parking lots.

You would think that Baguio's "lovers" would get the point after the horrendous earthquake of 1990 when much of it was leveled to the ground. But what did they do? They only planted more concrete to replace the trees and vegetation. They even erected a mall, altering a landscape that could have been its salvation in the recent floods.

People must love it so much that they have replaced most of its picturesque hills with their concrete homes that, if you really think about it, reminds one of tombs.

I have nothing personal against the people who wish to live and enjoy what Baguio has to offer. On the other hand, it is not hard to be indignant at those who have taken advantage of people's desires by letting settlements rise where they should not be, and for tearing down nature's hard work to protect its skin - the earth - from the occasional ravaging of the sky, and the dancing of the planet's plates.

The pushers of that drug, concrete, need to be exposed for the emptiness of their promises. Concrete is indeed a hallucinogen. It lulls humans into a false sense of security that they can be protected from the elements (and indeed themselves) by this plastic armor.

Too much concrete numbs humans and keeps them from feeling their connectedness with nature.

It is interesting to note that the other way that "haunting" came into my space today was by way of a filmmaker friend who had wanted to make amends for his childhood "sin" of stealing a friend's toy.

After all these years, his act of taking what was not his continues to haunt him, and to make up for it, he wanted to tell its story - perhaps as a way to ask for forgiveness (I suppose that he never stole again), and as a cautionary tale for those who are so tempted.

These two stories of haunting come together in my mind and I realize they are not unrelated.

The pushers of concrete, are also those who have been stealing, not only from the people, but also from the earth. They are the peddlers of infrastructure and extractive projects that leave our landscapes scarred and eroded, and our coffers empty. You figure out who they are. We are most probably related to many of them.

I know this partly wishful thinking, but in this season until November 1 and even beyond, I would like them to be haunted by their sins, and give back, not only by confession, but by ecological restoration.

Otherwise, they are only fit to become compost - and perhaps that is the only way they could give back to the earth from which they have stolen much.

They will have to have many many lives to replace those lives they have taken away.

Reminders from Ondoy

One of our fundamental planning problems is that most of what we now use as residential areas in Metro Manila were parts of floodplains and riverbeds. Subdivision were built on former wetlands, rivers & creeks "forced" to become straight, or cemented over to become roads, or to create more saleable space.
People cement over open spaces & natural vegetation, destroying the earth's capacity to drain storm water naturally.Simply put, we are just mostly in the way of the natural landscape processes in our very fragile and geologically young archipelago.

Flooding is a natural landscape process. Floods bring nutrients to ecosystems along waterways and make it possible for various forms of life to thrive.

Problems start when settlements sprout on floodplains, or when people insist on tampering with the natural shapes of rivers and tributaries. Builders insist on making water travel in a straight line instead of slowing it down by following the river's natural curves.

When we cover up the earth with cement, it loses its ability to absorb the water that naturally comes from the sky. It is not only trees that will help us prevent floods; water run-off is also absorbed by the various types of indigenous vegetation, like grass and shrubs that naturally occur along riverbanks.

Typhoon Ondoy is a reminder that we've forgotten that rivers have been here before us. It reminds us that we've been remiss with trying to find long-lasting solutions to the problems of our urban settlements. We've simply allowed developers to cover up too many wetlands and cut up too much land.



















We've also allowed ourselves to buy into their concept of development and be seduced by the idea of the "house & lot" dream home.

This dream only made our cities sprawl out, and obliterated natural waterways with the roads that had to lead to them. These very roads made us buy cars so that we could get to our homes out there. This increased pollution, carbon emissions and caused more roads to be built. Subdivisions near the hinterland, and in former agricultural lands or wetlands, displaced rural people, and increased land prices.

The images from the aftermath of Ondoy were very telling: roads turned into rivers, houses submerged by mud, and cars being carried away by currents.

On the other hand, images of people helping one another in this time of crisis were very inspiring and telling of a resilient people.

Perhaps we can harness that community spirit in preventing all this from happening again. We could start by rethinking where we live, and how we live. We could compel the authorities to ensure that those who will tend to settle in marginal land because they want to be near where the jobs are given a chance to live in safer areas.


















It may mean the end of the practice of gated communities that tend to be homogenous and therefore keep the poor out.

It could mean the start of new forms of communities, where rich and poor, middle class and middle poor will have to live right next to each other so that ALL are out of harm's way. It's not yet too late. There will be more generations that will inherit the earth. If we start now, we will be doing our grandchildren a favor.

Biodiversity in the City (Biodivercity!)

Cities conjure visions of congestion, skyscrapers, traffic, noise and pollution. Urbanites are usually depicted as world weary souls so alienated from nature they can't tell a cow from a dog. People are resigned that citi-zens will never make a difference in saving the planet.

Well, I disagree. Cities and citi-zens have a role. Citi-zens, rise up from your couches! Demand that our cities be walkable, be clean, be green (with indigenous vegetation/species, please), and manage urban sprawl! Let's stop pretending that developments at the slopes of fragile mountains and close to waterways are expressions of people being "one with nature." By keeping a proper density of buildings and wild vegetation in settlements, we are actually containing our largely destructive species within humane, livable places. We could also stop pretending that we can do no harm to the planet.

Be responsible, humans! Get to know the other species in the planet. And respect their habitats. (And, by the way, respect your own habitats, too.)

I just got home from China and my last stop was Hong Kong. Not to shop (in any case, I don't like shopping, anyway) but to bird and allow myself to be regenerated by nature. And man, did I encounter biodiversity! Not on my plate, but in the walks I took.

Here's a photo of a firefly.

He had a message! "Earthling, take me to your leader." "Fireflies have a right to the city, too," he said.

Oh, how do I know it's a "he?" Well, it was in the men's rest room at Tai Po Kau Nature reserve.







And here's another one.


Isn't it beautiful? That's a Psammodynastes pulverulentus, or Common Mock Viper. I nearly missed it if not for the watchful eyes of my friend/ nature guide in HK, birder- beerder-ecology teacher & topnotch nature photographer Samson So.

It was my first time to see a snake in the wild. So happy. And a firefly up close. I'm Delirious.
( 24 November 2008)