Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 13) — The Metro Manila Development Authority (MMDA) said it will support a ban on billboards along EDSA, which senators complained about during their deliberations on the agency’s proposed budget for next year.
This was what the agency said Wednesday when Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon asked if it will support a measure that would prohibit billboards from being erected within 50 meters from the center of the main thoroughfare.
“Let them put their billboards, but it should not interfere with and obstruct and distract the riding public. We must do something,” Drilon said.
The MMDA, through its budget’s sponsor Senator Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara, said it has tried removing billboards from EDSA, but advertisers countered this with suits and would only agree to relocating their advertisements if the MMDA paid for it.
Drilon said he is also willing to realign funds in the 2020 budget so that the MMDA can pay for the removal of billboards.
“We have converted EDSA into a billboard avenue and it has appeared that we are the only megacity here. If we cannot solve traffic immediately … we can at least clean EDSA of its visual blithe and probably have a more aesthetic main thoroughfare for Metro Manila,” Senator Francis Tolentino said.
Tolentino, during his time as MMDA chair, had planned for a total ban on billboards on EDSA — saying that since the highway is a heritage site that should be free from billboards — but this ultimately did not push through.
Lawmakers had also sought to pass laws that would better regulate billboards, but these have not cleared Congress.
