This photograph taken on August 22, 2024 reveals site visitors surveyor Irna Lapriza manually counting passing autos from a footbridge in Pasig Metropolis, Metro Manila. Rain or shine, by means of floods and automobile exhaust air pollution, some 34 site visitors surveyors employed by town authorities are deployed to a minimum of 16 main roads within the Philippine capital – their eyes leaping from one automobile to the subsequent, fingers clicking handbook tally counters as they log every passing car. Their tallies find yourself with the site visitors engineers of the Metropolitan Manila Improvement Authority (MMDA), who design and suggest cheap site visitors options. (Picture by Jam Sta Rosa / AFP)
Perched on a flowerbox at a busy intersection within the Philippine capital, Irna Lapriza’s eyes bounce from one automobile to the subsequent, her fingers flying throughout handbook tally counters as she logs every passing car.Rain or shine, by means of floods and automobile exhaust air pollution, the 41-year-old holds the fort as carmageddon performs out every day within the Southeast Asian metropolis notorious for its horrible gridlock.
Her tallies find yourself with the site visitors engineers of the Metropolitan Manila Improvement Authority (MMDA), who design and suggest cheap site visitors options.
“We’re proud of this job as a result of we all know how vital it’s. We don’t thoughts it when folks belittle what we do,” Lapriza advised AFP.
Her pink manicured fingers relaxation on six linked cylindrical counters — every for a special sort of auto.
She routinely logs about 7,000 vehicles, motorbikes and extra throughout an eight-hour shift that earns her round 17,000 pesos ($303) a month.
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Lapriza has been at it for 10 years, regardless that she will get the occasional headache from extended publicity to the tropical solar.
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Town authorities employs simply 34 handbook automobile counters, who put on reflective yellow security vests and are deployed to a minimum of 16 main roads.
“The info our site visitors surveyors get from counting vehicles on Metro Manila roads is essential,” mentioned Mar Anthony Santos, head of the MMDA’s site visitors survey part.
“It serves as the inspiration for our site visitors engineering interventions and insurance policies.”
This photograph taken on August 22, 2024 reveals a site visitors surveyor manually counting passing autos from a footbridge in Pasig Metropolis, Metro Manila. (Picture by Jam Sta Rosa / AFP)
Based mostly on the counters’ knowledge, Santos mentioned the MMDA put in a devoted bike lane and succeeded in lowering the frequency of accidents at Commonwealth Avenue, a northern Manila thoroughfare utilized by 408,000 motorists per day.
Car speeds on the avenue, beforehand infamous for crashes, additionally improved by 24 seconds over the roughly seven-kilometer (four-mile) stretch.
It takes Lapriza 45 minutes to commute the identical distance to work daily by jeep in one other a part of Manila.
Santos mentioned exams confirmed a handbook depend was extra correct than utilizing synthetic intelligence, as CCTVs can not depend precisely at night time or throughout heavy rain because of glare from headlights.
Manila, a sprawling metropolis of 13 million folks, has the world’s worst site visitors gridlock, in accordance with one survey.
The common journey time is 25 minutes and 30 seconds over 10 kilometers, in accordance with site visitors knowledge supplier Tomtom’s 2023 site visitors index report.
“That’s why we’re so decided to do that job nicely, as a result of I additionally endure from the site visitors jams,” Lapriza mentioned.
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