MMDA to resume number coding scheme during window hours

FILE: TRAFFIC BUILDUP. Motorists endure heavy traffic on Edsa northbound, near the Guadalupe MRT-3 station around 11 a.m. Thursday (March 31, 2022). To address this, the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority has proposed several new traffic schemes and modifications to government work hours to help ease vehicular traffic in the National Capital Region. (PNA photo by Ben Briones)

MANILA – The Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) is set to reimplement a variant of the Unified Vehicular Volume Reduction Program (UVVRP) that would limit the number of vehicles in the National Capital Region (NCR) during window hours in the morning and evening.

In an interview following a meeting of the Metro Manila Council (MMC) on Thursday, MMDA acting chair Carlo Dimayuga III said vehicles with license plates ending in certain digits would be prohibited from NCR roads from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. on weekdays, except holidays, beginning Monday, August 15.

Under the new number coding scheme, vehicles with license plates ending in 1 and 2 are prohibited on Mondays, 3 and 4 on Tuesdays, 5 and 6 and Wednesdays, 7 and 8 on Thursdays, and 9 and 0 on Fridays during the said window hours, allowing all vehicles to pass through NCR roads outside these hours.

“From August 15 to 17, we will start the dry run and will only remind motorists of the expanded number coding scheme. From August 18 onwards, the MMDA will start apprehending and will issue traffic violation tickets on the ground and through our non-contact apprehension policy,” Dimayuga said.

He said exemptions to the number coding are public utility vehicles (PUVs) including tricycles, transport network vehicle services (TNVS), motorcycles, garbage trucks, fuel trucks, marked government vehicles, fire trucks, ambulances, marked media vehicles, and motor vehicles carrying “essential or perishable goods.”

The reimplementation of the number coding scheme is expected to reduce traffic volume by 20 percent during peak hours and is seen to address the expected rise in vehicular volume with the beginning of the new school year this month and the return of full face-to-face classes in November.

Based on the latest vehicle volume count by the MMDA Traffic Engineering, around 387,000 vehicles passed through Edsa on August 4.

This is compared to an average of 405,000 vehicles plying Edsa on a daily basis before the Covid-19 pandemic.

On secondary roads, Dimayuga said existing number coding ordinances of respective local governments will instead be followed.

The new number coding scheme was announced through the release of MMDA Resolution No. 22-14, series of 2022.