‘Bring back the fireflies’: In metro Manila, a cycling brigade aims to cut pollution

A typical weekday turns metro Manila into a smoggy, gridlocked “Carmageddon” teeming with cars and jeepneys. But with most people off work and school on this sunny Sunday morning, the streets are calm – the perfect time for 100 cyclists to ride through Marikina and the neighboring city of Antipolo. 

Wearing unassuming beige jerseys marked “marshal,” about 20 women and men from the Firefly Brigade direct stops at red lights and block cars at intersections to ensure everyone can pass, including a father on a custom bike with children in tow, a man carrying shih tzu in a cargo bike, and a group of girlfriends on road bikes.

The Firefly Brigade is helping to keep ride participants safe as they celebrate one day in advance of World Bicycle Day in early June. But cyclists such as Warren Demdam and his friends have joined the event to show solidarity with the nongovernmental organization’s advocacy for safer bike lanes and less air pollution. 

“Cyclists face many challenges, but we cannot tackle them on our own. We need allies,” says Mr. Demdam, a metro Manila resident who has been a regular participant since 2016 in the Firefly Brigade’s monthly mass rides.

Birth of the brigade

Katti Sta. Ana never imagined founding a cycling group when, in 1997, she joined a long-distance mass ride in the Philippines, aspiring to become a triathlete. She grew frustrated during the event as she cycled down streets filled with homeless people. “I remember that day clearly,” Ms. Sta. Ana says. “I cried in front of my desktop computer, telling God that He was not doing anything to help the poor.”

“It did not take long before I envisioned people marching and riding bikes converging at Quezon Memorial Circle in protest,” she adds. She also soon realized that while she could not solve poverty, she could make an impact on the environment through her passion for cycling. 

As a visual artist, Ms. Sta. Ana often came up with ideas she never pursued, but this one was different – she couldn’t stop talking about organizing the event at Quezon Memorial Circle. A publishing company she designed bookmarks for proposed the advertising tagline, “When was the last time you saw the fireflies?” – a reference to the lightning bugs that serve as indicators of ecosystem health and that are disappearing with light pollution, pesticides, urban growth, and climate change. Fellow cyclists planned the route and secured permits, while Ms. Sta. Ana’s artist friends drew illustrations for newsletters to show how cycling reduces carbon emissions.

In April 1999, the inaugural Tour of the Fireflies attracted 200 cyclists in nature-themed costumes and helped the Firefly Brigade establish relationships with officials in all 17 local government units in metro Manila’s capital region.

A quarter century later, the women-led organization still promotes cycling and is still guided by its mission to “bring back the fireflies.” Besides organizing the monthly mass rides and the annual Tour of the Fireflies, the brigade holds clinics to teach biking skills and bike maintenance, donates safety gear and bike racks, and lobbies the government to create and maintain safe bikeways.

“When we started our group, having bike lanes here was unimaginable,” says Firefly Brigade chairperson Roselle Leah Rivera. “Motorization was seen as a benchmark for development in the Philippines, but it’s unsafe.”

Every year, air pollution from fossil fuels causes 27,000 premature deaths in the Philippines, according to a study by Greenpeace and the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air. In 2022, the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority documented 2,182 road crashes involving bicycles.

Raymond Palatino, secretary-general of the New Patriotic Alliance, a network of organizations in the Philippines advocating for human rights and the environment, echoes Ms. Rivera’s concerns. He emphasizes that car-centric development in the country exacerbates road congestion.

“Cars can only move a few passengers at a time,” explains Mr. Palatino. But he stresses that the primary problem is the limited public transportation options. Commuters face long lines to cram onto crowded buses, trains, and jeepneys.

It took the COVID-19 pandemic for the government to construct 497 kilometers (about 309 miles) of bike lanes across the Philippines’ metropolitan areas. Completed by June 2021, the bikeways supported many workers who turned to cycling when mass public transit systems were suspended. In 2021 alone, a nationwide survey by Social Weather Stations, a research group, noted that about 6.2 million households had at least one member who uses a bike for transportation, outnumbering car-owning households by 4 to 1.

But when traffic jams returned post-lockdown, motorists encroached on bike lanes, posing risks to cycling commuters. “Unfortunately, most bike lanes are just painted lines on roads,” and many cars ignore them, Mr. Palatino laments. 

He emphasizes that bike lanes marked off with barriers would benefit commuters who ride bicycles as well as those who rely on their bikes for their livelihood. “Some food vendors operate custom-built bicycles as mobile food stalls,” he says.

“We need advocates to pressure the government for better active transport infrastructure,” Mr. Palatino adds. “I appreciate the efforts of the cycling groups, including the Firefly Brigade. People can see the viability of using bikes every day.”

“A collective voice”

The Firefly Brigade has 20 to 30 active volunteers running cycling initiatives and 50 marshals tasked with keeping participants safe. Meanwhile, its Facebook community has more than 7,000 members. Many who volunteered or participated in the brigade’s mass rides over the years have formed their own cycling groups. Among them is Mia Bunao, who was inspired by the 2002 Tour of the Fireflies and joined the brigade two years later.

As the group’s project coordinator, Ms. Bunao has helped increase participation in the Tour of the Fireflies to more than 10,000 cyclists yearly. In 2009, she helped organize a forum at which the Metro Manila Development Authority presented a 200-kilometer bikeway plan. When the effort did not come to fruition, the Firefly Brigade secured sponsorship from the Embassy of the Netherlands to install bicycle racks in public spaces.

Commuters “know there’s safe parking” in such places, Ms. Bunao explains. She says the racks at the University of the Philippines in Quezon City, at Quezon City Hall, and at Pasig City Hall are the most utilized. 

Today, Ms. Bunao also runs Kalyetista, a group that advocates for sustainable transportation. She says devoting her time to cycling benefits bike riders like her and those in low-income communities whom she considers the “heroes” of the movement. 

“These people have been biking to work long before the pandemic,” Ms. Bunao says. “They don’t have time for mass rides. They just want to survive.”

Although Ms. Rivera says she believes metro Manila has a long way to go to become bike-friendly, she contemplates passing the torch to younger advocates such as Ms. Bunao. She reminisces about her days biking through Marikina when she was one of the few bike commuters and notes with satisfaction how far the Firefly Brigade has traveled.

“We have a collective voice now,” Ms. Rivera says. “It’s a huge leap.”