BY DOMINIQUE GABRIEL G. BAÑAGA
BACOLOD City – Fastcraft operators servicing the Bacolod City – Iloilo City route and vice versa are reluctant to add more trips despite the downgrading of pandemic alerts to Level 1 or the “new normal” in Bacolod and Level 2 in Iloilo.
The volume of passengers remains low even though travel restrictions have been relaxed, said Frank Carbon, operator of Weesam Express.
He placed fastcrafts’ “passenger (seat) utilization rate” at only 50 percent.
There are a total of eight trips daily between Bacolod City and Iloilo City, or two trips for every shipping line scheduled between morning and afternoon (Weesam Express and OceanJet Fast Ferry Corporation).
On the other hand, Chelsea Logistics’ SuperCat Fast Ferry Corporation has yet to resume operating; its ships and personnel temporarily returned to their home base in Cebu.
Under Alert Level 1, intrazonal and interzonal movement in Bacolod City is no longer restricted even for minors and persons with comorbidities, although proper health protocols must still be observed.
Travel requirements for Bacolod City remain the same – vaccination card for fully-vaccinated travelers and a BacTrac identification card. BaCTrac is a contact tracing system (web-based and mobile-based) developed for efficient contact tracing of confirmed coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) positive patients in Bacolod City and, consequently, allows the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) Task Force to easily locate people suspected of having contact with COVID-19 patients.
The unvaccinated, on the other hand, or those who have yet to complete their COVID-19 vaccination are required to submit a negative rapid antigen test from a laboratory certified by the Department of Health (DOH).
The city also has the right to refuse entry to travelers who fail to comply with the set travel requirements by invoking Section 4.3 of the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) Memorandum Circular No. 2021-035 dated March 24, 2021.
Bacolod City also warned that those presenting fake or tampered travel documents will be held liable./PN
