Go Philippines: Tricycle...Tuk-tuk...Auto Rickshaw

Next to jeepney, tricycle or "traysikel" in Tagalog is another popular form of public transportation in the Philippines. Tricycle can be found anywhere in the Philippines because its cheap, small and serve same as function of taxi usually in a small route. Tricycle is synonymous to tuk-tuk in Eastern Africa, keke-marwas in Nigeria, baby taxis or CNG's in Bangladesh, auto rickshaws or auto in India, bajaj in Indonesia, chand gari or qingqi in Pakistan, mototaxi or moto in El Salvador, coco taxis in Cuba, taxi cholo or cholo taxi in Peru. So this is not popular only in the Philippines but all over the world. In Philippines, tricycle is a evolution of pedicab which Japanese popularized in 1960 and then evolve it 19 to become motorized.

The configuration of tricycle is compose of motorcycle plus the sidecar that is mounted in the right side. The typical design is good for 5 passenger with two at the back of the driver, and three on side car. But some model modified it to make it good for 7 passenger. Tricycles are used primarily as passenger car but sometimes it is use also for cargo. This car is intended usually for narrow road were other passenger car like jeepneys of buses cannot be entered. This is also used for travelling very rough road and rolling terrain. They are not permitted in tollways they are allowed to travel in most of national roads.

The organization for tricycle is called TODA which stand for Tricycle Operators and Drivers Association. Local Government regulates the TODA under TRU (Tricycle Regulation Unit).

Riding in tricyle has good and bad. Good things are cheaper fare, you can ask the driver exactly the location of your destination even it is in a small road, and mostly you can find this even in early morning like between 12 AM to 5AM where jeepneys are seldom to pass by in some areas. The bad things are you are prone to smoke, dust and noise pollution due to its lower and open built; sometimes you will become wet during rainy days; more expensive than jeepneys; slower than jeepneys and more dangerous that jeepneys in case of accident.