QuestionsQuestions (Republic Act No. 2000)
The Act declares that it is necessary for the immediate preservation of public peace, health, and safety, and for the promotion of the general welfare.
A limited access facility is a highway or street designed for through traffic, where owners/occupants of abutting land have no right or only limited right of access (including access, light, air, or view) because their property abuts such facility, or for other reasons.
It mentions parkways (from which trucks, busses, and other commercial vehicles shall be excluded) and free ways open to customary forms of street and highway traffic.
The Department of Public Works and Communications (DPWC) is authorized to plan, designate, establish, regulate, vacate, alter, improve, maintain, and provide limited access facilities.
Within provinces, cities and towns, establishment must have the consent of the provincial board, city council, or municipal council, as the case may be.
DPWC is authorized to design and regulate/restrict/prohibit access to best serve traffic, and its determination of design shall be final.
Raised curbings, central dividing sections, or other physical separations; or separate roadways may be designated by signs, markers, stripes, and appropriate lane guidance devices.
No. No person has any right of ingress or egress to/from/across limited access facilities except at designated points where access may be permitted, under specified terms and conditions.
DPWC may recommend acquisition of public property and property rights (including access, air, view, and light) by gift, devise, purchase, or condemnation as authorized for highways and streets.
Yes. The Act states that all property rights acquired under it shall be in fee simple.
In its discretion, a government may acquire an entire lot, block, or tract even if the entire area is not immediately needed for the right-of-way, if it best serves public interest.
Court proceedings necessary for acquisition under the Act shall take precedence over other non-public-interest cases to expedite limited access facility cases.
DPWC may provide for elimination of intersections at grade through grade separation or service roads, or by closing roads at the right-of-way boundary line; after establishment, no non-participating highway/street shall intersect at grade.
No. No city, town, barrio street, provincial or national highway, or other public way shall be opened into or connected with such facility without DPWC’s consent and prior approval.
Consent and approval are given only if the public interest shall be served thereby.
Local service roads are local streets/roads planned, designated, established, or used in connection with limited access facilities. DPWC and city/municipal/provincial governments may plan and exercise jurisdiction over them similarly to limited access facilities, if necessary/desirable.
Prohibited acts include driving over/ across curb/dividing sections or lines, making left turns/ U-turns except through designated openings, driving in the wrong lane/direction, or entering from a local service road except through designated openings. Violations are punished under the penal provisions of the Philippine Highway Act of 1953 and the Revised Penal Code.
Yes. If any section or clause is declared invalid or inapplicable, it does not affect the rest of the Act, and inconsistent laws are repealed only to the extent of inconsistency for application to limited access facilities.
It shall take effect immediately upon approval (approved June 22, 1957).