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The shape and size of Cebu makes it a bit unique. As an island that's far longer than it is wide, with outlying islands that are also limited in size, each and every city or town in Cebu ends up having a sizable shoreline.
This arrangement gives each and every city or town in Cebu access to a resource many places in larger islands like Luzon and Mindanao do not have: The sea. And while landlocked local government units go to lengths just to gain access to the sea for sea transport, harvesting ocean resources or simply to draw water, we in Cebu seem to make it a point to eventually dump soil into our shores to expand our shorelines ? every city in Cebu whose status is elevated to ?highly urbanized? gets the same idea: Reclaim the sea.
First, we had Cebu City with its North Reclamation Area. Mandaue City followed suit with its own reclaimed land. Now, with Lapu-Lapu City as Cebu?s newest highly urbanized city, it, too, has already drawn up plans for its own reclamation area. Even towns are playing with the idea of having their own reclamation areas.
Why?
The usual excuse is to spur a local government unit?s economic growth by giving investors more space to invest in. Honestly, I find that excuse a bit of a joke. As much as reclaimed land does give investors more space to invest in, Cebu local government units have not even maximized the lands bestowed upon them by nature, and already they want to artificially expand their shorelines.
I?m not even going to join the bandwagon of suspicions that these multi-billion-peso reclamation projects are mainly meant to spell multi-million-peso kickbacks to people in certain levels of government. There are people far more knowledgeable than myself who can tackle that issue. My gripe is simply the issue of land use: Why reclaim when there?s still so much natural land that has not even been optimized yet?
Take Cebu City, for example. I love this city and would love to see it develop sustainably. And while I have high hopes for the possibilities opened up by the South Road Properties (SRP, formerly the South Reclamation Project), it needs no pointing out that it?s still as barren as a desert. I also point out that the old North Reclamation Area (NRA), on which the Cebu Daily News building, SM City Cebu, and other landmarks stand, is still mostly vacant. City Hall officials have said time and again that each and every lot in the NRA is already owned. Yet on my daily trips to work, I cannot help but see that so many lots in the NRA remain idle and unused.
Then again, I do not even need to look at any of the reclamation areas to see how underutilized city land has been. Just take a closer look at the city?s center and one can still see so many areas where land could earn far more than how they?re currently being used. I?m talking about how, even at the heart of the city, buildings that are only three to four storeys in height occupy so much prime city real estate. These lots could be far, far more useful if they were occupied by taller buildings, which would allow for more workable office space (more commerce, more employment, etc.) while still using the same lot size. Owners of these lots could take a hint from the Crown Regency Hotel, Club Ultima, and the under-construction Ultima Residences. These buildings are becoming key landmarks of Cebu City for being some of the tallest in the locality, but they serve a far better example as prime city real estate being used to their full potential.
There?s a saying that goes, ?It?s not the size that matters, it?s how you use it.? This most certainly applies to land use. In the case of Cebu City, as with its neighbors Mandaue and Lapu-Lapu, gaining more land area through reclamation projects may not necessarily be the best answer to spur economic growth. There?s still so much land in all three cities that have not been used to their full potential. Having an airport in Lapu-Lapu shouldn?t prevent the entire city from building tall, just certain areas.
Instead of creating new real estate to build on, perhaps city legislators should create laws that encourage better use of land that?s already there. Pass ordinances that give incentives for the construction of taller buildings or penalize buildings that underutilize a land?s value, or perhaps even both.
We don?t need more land. We just need to make better use of what?s already there. Take land-locked Makati. They had no seas to reclaim, so they just made better use of what land it had. Now, it?s the center of commerce for the country. If they could do that, why can?t we? And here we are in Cebu, looking to spend billions just to make more land out of the sea when we already have so much land that?s simply not used efficiently.
After all, why build on water when we can still build on land?
