Friday, July 17, 2009 | MANILA, PHILIPPINES [ BusinessWorld Online ]
ILOILO CITY — An urban planning outfit aims to revitalize the waterfront area of Iloilo City into a prime recreational area.
Felino Palafox, Jr., managing partner of Palafox Associates, said Iloilo City’s 21.3-kilometer coastline and 113-kilometer riverbank can be developed to accommodate restaurants and other leisure establishments. The Iloilo River can also be used for a ferry service as an alternative mode of transportation to decongest the city’s roads.
The Iloilo City government has commissioned Palafox Associates to craft the city’s 2009-2020 Comprehensive Land Use Plan.
Mr. Palafox said Iloilo City needs better roads, sidewalks and bicycle and motorcycle lanes to promote environment-friendly urban planning. "If there are good sidewalks and bike lanes, you will encourage walking and biking which can offset emissions from vehicles. We will incorporate in our proposed [land use plan] green urban planning," he said.
Mr. Palafox noted that the 1998-2010 land use plan and zoning ordinance of Iloilo City is obsolete. "The problem is that we have the wrong types of development at the wrong place and at a wrong time," he said.
An updated land use plan will attract investors in real estate and other sectors to Iloilo City, he said. "The initial buyers of real estate in Manila were Ilonggos. With a viable development plan for the city, the illustrious citizens would come back here and more investors will follow," he said.
Mr. Palafox also pushed for the improvement of basic infrastructure such as roads, drainage systems, flood control, electricity, telephone lines, and streetlights.
The waterfront area, also known as Muelle Loney, saw the boom in the sugar and textile industry in Western Visayas in 1700s to 1900s. In the 1700s to early 1800s, there was already a large-scale weaving industry in Iloilo. The port became the most bustling and prosperous port outside Manila.
The Iloilo River Wharf was developed to export textile to Manila. It became a favored port because it was natural protected from strong winds and tropical monsoons by the nearby Guimaras island. The sugar industry in Western Visayas boomed with the opening of the Iloilo port to international trade in 1855.
British vice-consul Nicholas Loney, after whom the waterfront area was named, arrived in 1866 and further boosted trade in the port through his firm Loney and Ker Co., which encouraged sugar trade in Negros and Panay by importing modern machinery from Europe and paving the way for sugar planters to get crop loans. — Francis Allan L. Angelo
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