Apartments 'no longer an ivory tower'

Apartments 'no longer an ivory tower'

By I. Christianto

JAKARTA (JP): A megalopolis with a cosmopolitan population,
Jakarta has transformed into a capital with modern buildings,
including high-rise residences. More people are realizing the
benefits of individual strata-titled apartments, either through
renting or buying serviced apartment units.

Developers once targeted expatriates as the biggest potential
market, but many locals are now moving into apartments. Architect
Johan Silas, a professor from 10 November Institute of
Technology, Surabaya, has won international awards for his
research, studies and plans on public housing. He talks about the
future of apartment living in Indonesia.

Question: What is the background to development of luxury
apartments in Indonesia?

Answer: The obvious background was the high economic growth,
the demand generated by the increasing numbers of foreign experts
coming to Indonesia (particularly Jakarta) and the surplus money
floating around, in private hands as well as in the banks. This
phenomenon occurred in the late 1980s and early 1990s. About the
last reason, the surplus money needed a place for investment,
which drew the attention of real estate developers to take
advantage of the apparent opportunities.

Q: But was it a condition of apartments really being needed in
Indonesia?

A: The three aforementioned reasons were the condition that no
normal private sector would neglect for any reason. This is not
new and Indonesia has been a good student that quickly learned
from what happened in Manila and Bangkok.

Q: What are the advantages and disadvantages of such apartment
developments?

A: In the early stages when the development of the serviced
apartments followed the conducive economic condition, many
advantages could be identified, such as support to develop the
property business aside from the already developed conventional
businesses. However, when the market started to become saturated,
and still surplus money was available in substantial amounts,
some developers started to manipulate the market, which basically
created a fictive demand on an uncontrolled growth scale. This
was one of the reasons for the collapse of the economy. Many
owners lost their core business by getting themselves involved
too deeply in property when they did not have the slightest
understanding of its behavior, let alone its consequences.

Q: Based on their sociocultural background, do Indonesians like
living in apartments? Are they ready to live in apartments?

A: Culture is not static, it changes depending on the pressure
and opportunity. The influence of agriculture to the development
of culture is gradually giving way to the industrial way of
thinking. Information technology further pushes the changes in
how people communicate using the Internet rather than by sending
letters. In Surabaya we successfully developed rental apartments
for low-income people in the 1980s. The model has been replicated
in Jakarta and Tangerang by us and in other places by others.
Given the way it was prepared and how it allowed the residents to
join in deciding the design of the apartment, there should be no
objections as to why a serviced apartment cannot work for a
particular community.

Q: How do you view the trend of living in apartments?

A: The traumatic events which occurred in apartments in Jakarta
in May 1998 (during mob attacks, mainly directed at ethnic
Chinese) need time to be forgotten by those who know or had the
terrible experience themselves. The many empty apartments in
Jakarta now add to the negative image. I believe that now special
efforts should be taken to make the idea of living in apartments
attractive again, especially in terms of locality. However, the
cost of living in apartments and the near bankruptcy of the
apartment owners make the effort to revitalize the existing
apartments difficult although not impossible. It needs to be
dealt with on a case-by-case basis. I think there are enough
experts to undertake this assignment.

Q: Does living in (serviced) apartments reflect snobbery or
modern living?

A: Some (residents) are indeed snobbish, but quite a number make
a sound judgment to opt to live in serviced apartments. It's not
necessarily related to modern living, but can be part of a new
lifestyle and high mobility of professionals, including the many
women participants in the new working ways.

Q: How do you view the regulations on serviced apartment
ownership?

A: The strata title on apartment ownership approved by the law is
not a problem anymore in terms of ownership which is not really
related to land.

Q: Do most apartment buildings in Indonesia meet the basic
architectural standards?

A: By now there are many (builders of) model low-income
apartments and apartments with sufficient years of experience.
There should be no difficulty whatsoever to develop any kind of
apartment to meet different kinds of demands. It's only a matter
of finding the right expert to deal with the respective need or
demand in apartment design and development, including for low-
income owners or rental apartments.

Q: High-rise buildings have durability or a long lifespan. Still,
after a certain period, a building must be totally renovated for
safety reasons. Is there a regulation or legal stipulation
concerning this for serviced apartments in Indonesia?

A: It is true that in most Indonesian cities, building
regulations not only lag behind the demand of the construction
industry itself, but many of the regulations do not meet and are
not capable of serving the unique context of "modern" Indonesia.
Hong Kong can give an excellent example of how the city
government renovated the old Mark IV apartment into money-making
apartments. Again, in this respect, the city government needs to
challenge local universities to develop manuals and guidelines on
how to assess buildings that have passed their design lifetime.

Q: How can living in apartments affect the way of life of the
occupants? Does it change their habits?

A: I stayed in many kinds of apartments when I studied in Europe,
the United States and Japan. The hardest adjustment for me to
living in apartments was in Japan. This is because we in
Indonesia are accustomed to staying in buildings that have ample
space for different purposes. In Japan, a middle-class apartment
allows you to move around very little. Also the space outside the
buildings is so limited. However, after only two months or three
months you easily adjust to the new situation. If the purpose is
clear, the adjustment process is easy and without pain.

Q: What other problems may arise?

A: This depends heavily on the situation one has to live in in an
apartment and also how the decision to live in the apartment is
made. My experience in living and working with people who have to
live in apartments shows that they have to have an early good
understanding of apartments and to be assisted in the early days
of living in apartments. This applies to both high and low-income
people.

Q: There was a case of social unrest in St. Louis in the United
States in 1972 which ended with the destruction of the apartment
building by residents. Could that happen in Indonesia?

A: To my students, this is a classic case of architects who are
arrogant by believing that they can solve all the architectural
problems of the people. This has happened to Indonesia, only the
apartments were not destroyed. But many cases are proof that the
syndrome can easily be avoided, such as the cases mentioned
earlier in my reply. Charles Jencks called it the "death of
modern architecture".

Q: What about trends in serviced apartments in Surabaya?

A: In Surabaya we still have many houses that the expatriate
prefers. However, as I have mentioned, we have no difficulty in
attracted low-income people to live in apartments that have been
well looked after by the occupants. It is important to make good
preparation before deciding on apartments to solve any particular
housing problem.

Q: Any further comments?

A: My brief comment is that sooner rather than later in cities
with populations above one million, low-rise, high-density
apartments need to be considered and prepared. Again, as I have
mentioned many times, it is not easy to develop apartment blocks,
but it is also not impossible nor unfeasible.