By MITA Q. SISON-DUQUE
(Hi there, blog friends and readers! Been many weeks since I last wrote an entry here. Well, still busy doing this and that, going here and there, but hopefully soon, I shall bounce back, write entries again here and visit you in your “homes” too. But in the meantime, let me share with you this piece from a noted writer. Thanks and see you around!)
IN MANILA, in the last years of Mayor Lito Atienza’s term as mayor, Roxas Boulevard acquired a more updated look, “japorms” as the youthful pop lingo of today would term it. A boardwalk beside the sea underwent a transformation, so that on dark nights, the existence of a foreboding sea becomes incidental.
Aside from the colorful futuristic-looking street lamps which lighted the length of the old Dewey Boulevard was a short strip from one end to the other on the side of the US Embassy, which has become animated with restaurants, cafes, lights, music from live bands, the statues of two uniformed American soldiers, one pointing out to the other, looking out to the Manila Bay, dinosaurs, and life. Tourists and locals alike can be seen walking through on the boulevard unmindful of any danger that could possibly be there. Not in this one lighted city underlined by gaiety and fun.
How it was recalled that Lake Shore Drive in Chicago was similar to Dewey Boulevard in Manila. American architect Burnham first saw the similarity between Manila and Chicago when he came after WWlI to a devastated Manila. When he drew plans for the battle-scarred city, putting the US Embassy at the base of the boulevard and developing, planting coconut trees after the breakwater, little did he imagine that another architect in the future would add that portion of the boardwalk that would add color to Manila in the new millennium, a dash of old Europe, American pizzazz, in a tropical setting. Until Mayor Atienza’s term came to an end, and his younger son, Ali, beaten by veteran mayor, one time presidential candidate Alfredo Lim, took over.
Then there went the boardwalk. The dinosaurs were taken home by Atienza since he owned them. The restaurants and cafes were either transferred or dismantled. The music and live bands came to a complete stop, and in their stead plant boxes were built every few meters where there once was life. Cause of death: alcohol sold indiscriminately. There was not much fuss. Political observers and cosmopolitan Manilans shrugged it off as political virus as cause of death. But not all observers. Some are saddened by the demise of the Manila boardwalk. How fast it was to be dismantled, just when it became a must-see in the evenings when there is nothing else in that strip but some casinos and some restaurants as one took a drive around the city.
It is thought by yet more that if Bayani Fernando, MMDA chief, were faced with such problem, he would have found a solution to the problem, preserving what was a new experience for the city, and the tourists. Fernando would not have condemned the boardwalk because of the kinks but found ways to iron them out. He did not condemn Manila’s traffic problem where it looked almost impossible to do so. He built new routes. He did not shoot down the pedestrians that caused the traffic jams by their indiscriminate crossings of highways and roads. He built fences to keep them from crossing and from getting killed and warned them. He built pedestrian overpasses, and when the covered overpasses became haven for shady characters, he took off the roofs to disrupt their covers.
He built pink fences to beautify what would have been gross additions and where he found it distasteful to see grown men indiscriminately using buildings and streets to relieve themselves in public, he built pink urinals so they could be disciplined in their habits. No violence, no destruction or tearing down of buildings and establishments.
Politics aside, Bayani Fernando, could have thought of a solution, less violent and more humane, listening to all Manilans before swooping down on what was, no matter how crude it was, a boardwalk that livened an old city.
(Note: Mita is author of two books: “Embraced by Sun” and “A Nation, A President” (biography of former President Fidel V. Ramos). She is married to Dr. Salvador T. Duque, Chancellor of family owned Lyceum Northwestern University in Dagupan City. Mita writes for People’s Digest Newsweekly, a community newspaper based in Dagupan City and Lifestyle section of The Manila Bulletin.)
But then again, Lake Shore drive in Chicago didn’t have those bars lining up the sidewalks either.
HAH! i told marco that Burnham guy deisgned Manila. HAH! One up over incredulous boyfriends!!!!!!!11111
The Baywalk strip is now dark and gloomy with many lights from lamp posts needing replacement, or the cables stolen by vagrants.
i feel lucky that i had the chance to visit and even post pics of baywalk in my blog before its too late. it is such a pity that the place may go to waste. anyways, miss ur posts and always take care rhodora.
Hi there! Love your article. But I believe Burnham came to Manila after the spanish revolution in Manila. By wwII he was dead already.
Cheers! Yes. I agree with you. Bayani could be the saviour of Manila if it was possible.
right you are. BF is one thinking guy that can really implement things. he’s not popular with the masses though because he’s not a politician when dealing with them.
wish the whole pinas can emulate marikina’s example
“In 1904, Secretary of War Taft told W. Cameron Forbes, a member of the Philippine Commission, to secure the services of a city planner. Forbes went to the top and got Daniel Burnham to come and lay out a plan for the place. Burnham spent maybe six weeks looking around; of equal importance, he then recommended a protege, who stayed on for a decade to implement the Burnham Plan. The plan is typical of Burnham’s work–neoclassical buildings connected by treed boulevards and great swaths of lawn. More significantly, perhaps, Burnham worked hard to preserve the Spanish colonial city he found. Rather than replace it, he concentrated his efforts on the south and east margins of Intramuros–the landward sides. As he wrote, the colonial buildings were “especially interesting and in view of their beauty and practical suitability to local conditions could profitably be taken as examples of future structures.” It’s a very early case of a Western planner respecting the city he’s been hired to improve. Of course, Burnham was really preserving a European city in Asia, which is not so startling as the idea of preserving an Asian city. Still, it was a pioneering venture. (Burnham’s words are quoted from Thomas S. Hines, “American Modernism in the Philippines: The Forgotten Architecture of William E. Parsons,” J. of the Soc. of Arch. Historians, December 1973.)”
http://www.greatmirror.com/index.cfm?countryid=355&chapterid=904&picturesize=medium
also, Burnhman did not come to redesign a devastated Manila after the war—he was dead by 1912 according to Wikipedia.
Update: the lights are back on the lamp posts, but you’re still on your own when crossing the boulevard — no traffic lights still.
Hi,
Dewey, now Roxas Boulevard, WAS patterned after Lake Shore Drive complete with service roads and a yacht club. What we have done with it is a shame! The reclaimed area would have been great if we could promenade along the shore, much like those in Chicago enjoy Lake Michigan, but no! CCP alone would have looked like it was floating had Marcos and Imelda not built so many buildings beside and behind it. Now there’s (yet another) road named after Macapagal Boulevard and we’re to make the area compete with Macau in gambling!
As for Lito Atienza, I felt the lights were not elegant, and neither were the businesses there. Those giant coffee and soda advertisements were plain distracting. They all did obstruct the magnificent view. He should have followed Ming Ramos’ tasteful restoration of the bridges over Pasig River (whatever happened to that project?), and continued with Intramuros project instead.
The businesses there dismantled their shacks without waiting to be torn down, not so much because they wanted to save whatever they could, but it seems that they were there rent-free and contract-free somehow.
I believe Lim’s plan for the baywalk (not board walk as there are no floorboards like Atlantic City has) is better, in that he plans to hold cultural activities. We Filipinos should appreciate open spaces more. We tend to fill up all possible land (and sea) with what we love to call ‘infrastructure’ or ‘development.’
Lastly, I like the U-turn slots, hate the polka dotted urinals. They should just threaten to ‘bobbitize’ Filipino males who insist on bringing out their bobbits in public.
Manila and its people are strong (stubborn , ;-), I guess the boardwalk will be back in the future…
I feel saddened by this. Manileños did have a very good place to while away, without expending so much hard-earned money. Now, a good thing went away.
We still miss those dinosaurs. You have to admit, those dinosaurs and all those establishments somehow brought Manila back to life.