MMDA orders utility companies to remove cables obstructing QC footbridge

By Jel Santos

Utility companies on Tuesday were ordered by the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) to remove the cable wires on the footbridge along Mindanao Avenue-Congressional Avenue in Quezon City.

Photo by Linus Guardian Escandor/ MANILA BULLETIN FILE PHOTO

MMDA staff will be sent to the footbridge to cut the cables should the utility companies fail to comply.

The MMDA said they already called the attention of concerned companies in July last year. However, the companies still did not remove the wires which are posing danger to passersby of the said footbridge.

In the agency’s final notice of cable cutting dated February 14, the utility companies were given only until February 21 to remove and relocate the wires that are obstructing the walkway of the footbridge.

Netizen Pio Gerona Fortuno Jr. posted on Facebook the cables last February 14, and has now garnered 1.4 million views, more than 8, 000 reactions, and was shared approximately 19, 000 times.

Fortuno said in his post: “I don’t know which is more dangerous —crossing the busy Mindanao Ave/Congressional Ave intersection below or the newly built elevated pedestrian walk that has utility wires on the path that force you to dance ‘tinikling.’”

Jose Arturo Garcia, MMDA general manager, said some of the companies have already coordinated with the MMDA’s engineering department.

He assured that the cables will be cut if the companies fail to follow the deadline the MMDA has set.

The MMDA did not disclose the names of the utility companies.