Subic business wants billboards banned along SCTEx

[Guest]

Caps lock is activated.

[Forum Admin]

 

SUBIC BAY FREE PORT — Businessmen in this free port are now advocating for a ban on commercial billboards along the scenic Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway (SCTEx), pointing out that an unsullied view of the natural landscape would be a better come-on for tourists.

Prof. Danny Piano, president of the Subic Bay Freeport Chamber of Commerce (SBFCC), said tourists have expressed appreciation of the billboard-free view along the SCTEx, adding that a lack of clear-cut policies on commercial billboards might spur the proliferation of giant outdoor advertisements along the 94-kilometer expressway.

“The scenery along SCTEx, when blocked by giant billboards, could also seriously harm tourism in the area,” Piano warned.

[See original Subic Chamber Position Paper here]
 

[Forum Admin]

The fight against billboards along the SCTEx continues. It is gaining a lot of traction and now even President Arroyo shows support to the move initiated by the Subic Chamber, SBMA, and the City of Olongapo. From a report by Joyce Pangco Pañares in Manila Standard:

President Gloria Arroyo said Sunday she wanted billboards banned along the 94-kilometer Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway that might block the view from the newly built road.

“I will ask our legal team to look at the laws we can invoke to ensure there will be no billboards along [the new road],” she says.

Deputy presidential spokesman Gary Olivar said safety considerations also led to the Palace position that billboards should not be allowed to proliferate along the expressway.

Earlier, the members of the Subic Bay Freeport Chamber of Commerce said they opposed billboards on the highway because those could harm tourism in the area.

“Imagine the ill-effects that billboards will bring to Subic and the areas along [the highway],” group head Danny Piano said.

See the Olongapo-Subic website for more news and info about it.
 

[gabriella]

Two thumbs up!!

[Philly]

I have driven members of my Filipino family along the SCTEx and always enjoyed the oohs and ahhs as they saw, some at advanced age, what their own country SHOULD look like.  I'm particularly glad I was able to show it to my dear departed mother-in-law before she passed on ... she was so happy to be able to see her country as it used to be, before crass "commercialism at all cost" became the apparent watchword of the Philippines.

I am not insensitive to business and the need to advertise, but one only has to look at the mess that has been made along the Candaba Viaduct on the NLEX to see what rampant, un-restricted "billboardism" does to ruin the beauty of the countryside.  And the majority of these billboards are unused anyway, indicating they really aren't as profit generating as the investors wanted them to be, anyway.

Let's try to keep the views along the SCTEx as pristine as possible ... surely the time to act is now, before the seemingly inevitable billboard blight ruins this beautiful landscape also.  "Pinoy Pride" ought to mean more than just rooting for Manny to win his next fight ... I urge my Filipino brethren to protect the gifts God gave us.

[gabriella]

Let's try to keep the views along the SCTEx as pristine as possible ... surely the time to act is now, before the seemingly inevitable billboard blight ruins this beautiful landscape also.  "Pinoy Pride" ought to mean more than just rooting for Manny to win his next fight ... I urge my Filipino brethren to protect the gifts God gave us.

But I love the Pacman  But yes I agree that the SCTEX is worth protecting.

[yoda]

I think that I shall never see, a billboard lovely as a tree.

[Forum Admin]

 
Now that the Subic-Clark corridor land-use plan allots commercial spaces for pockets of land along the SCTEx, it is more important than ever that we be more vigilant. We cannot lay waste the SCTEx skyline.