“Walk, Baguio, Walk,” Baguio’s push to promote walking as an entry point in rallying its residents to actively support environmental thrusts for a more wholesome urban landscape, will be renewed with the next “Walk Day” set on July 14.

The medical sector, through the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center (BGHMC) headed by director Manuel Factora, will take the lead this time, as announced during the launching program last June 2 at the city’s athletic oval.

For July, the “Walk 2” multi-agency organizing committee led by BGHMC, city go-vernment, Baguio Regreening Movement, National Economic Development Authority, Department of Transportation and Communications, and the Cordillera Association of Regional Executives are likewise firming up consolidation of plans for the implementation of Fil-Am Friendship Day, the Cordillera Month; the Anniversary of the 1990 earthquake; and Disaster Consciousness Month to ensure full participation of all government agencies in stationed in Baguio.

Since the kick-off that drew some 2,000 participants, officials at City Hall
have initiated measures to sustain the drive, topped by a decision by mayor Reinaldo Bautista Jr. against lifting the “number coding scheme” designed to ease traffic within the central business district.

The mayor has also ordered a “no parking policy” this month within the city’s university belt, thereby clearing roads leading to and from schools with the opening of the academic year.

The mayor renewed his push for converting Session Road into a walking promenade and ordered a study for a six-day-a-week ban on vehicles within the central business district instead of the one-day-per-week provided in the “number coding” ordinance.

Vice mayor Daniel Fariñas has also proposed every Friday as car-less day so private vehicle owners would walk or take the cab or jeepney in going to and from their work.

The car-less day concept was successfully implemented about eight years ago in Bogota, the capital of Colombia, under the leadership of then mayor Enrique Peñalosa.

“A city is made for people, not for cars,” Peñalosa said when he presented the Bogota Model during the World Urban Forum in Sweden
in 2005.

City administrator Peter Fianza, action officer of Walk, Baguio, Walk has proposed that vehicles of city employees covered by the number coding scheme should not be parked within the City Hall premises to allow space for the public.

The next Walk Day will rally workers and officials to again walk to the city athletic bowl for a flag cere-mony and to their offices and residences. Those who can’t are encouraged to leave their cars at home and ride the taxi or the jeep, thereby helping reduce pollution and loosen up traffic congestion. 

Participants will again be asked to submit practical and do-able suggestions, including what they are doing and what it will take to improve the urban environment.

“Phase out old vehicles emitting smoke,” one participant wrote last June 2. Another called for a more aggressive crackdown on smoke-belching vehicles. Another sought the removal of obstacles along sidewalks “for
‘Walk, Baguio, Walk’ to really work.”

The district office of the Department of Public Works and Highways vowed to use coconut fiber in its slope protection and erosion control projects.

In the eyes of a child, sustaining the walk rally would also strengthen family bonding while helping clear the urban air.

“If you do care for us, I hope that you adults could start showing us you really do by leaving your cars at home,” said 11-year-old Iszkra Samara Liporada in her message at the program launching.