Are self-contained cities the answer?
Are self-contained cities the answer?
JAKARTA (JP): Government officials and urban city analysts
have said that developing new self-contained urban centers or
growth centers, which integrate industrial, cultural and housing
areas in one location, is a pragmatic solution to overcoming the
urban problems in Indonesia.
Ferdinand Sonneville, the president of Federation
Internationale des Administration de Bien at Conceils Immobiliers
(FIABCI), said in a two-day seminar which ended yesterday, that
such an approach will help reduce the population problem of a
metropolis like Jakarta.
"It will help encourage people to leave the city and move to
new towns," said Sonneville in an indirect reference to a more
radical suggestion of decentralizing political power in Indonesia
to solve the urban problem.
Jakarta Deputy Governor for Economic and Development Tubagus
M. Rais reiterated that in the 1970s the city administration
cooperated with its West Java counterpart to develop buffer areas
which were later integrated into the greater Jakarta area. The
buffer zones include Tangerang in the west, Bogor in the south
and Bekasi in the east.
Rais said the integration of the buffer zones in Jabotabek
resulted in a decrease in Jakarta's population growth from four
percent in the 1970s to 2.4 percent in the 1980s.
"It's quite a success story isn't it?" Rais asked.
On the other hand, Rais stated, the population growth in the
buffer zones has been higher than in Jakarta, with Bogor
recording a yearly increase of 4.1 percent, Tangerang of 6.1
percent and Bekasi of 6.3 percent.
A property analyst who asked not to be named from Colliers
Jardine, however, told The Jakarta Post during a break that such
a method should not be based on the so-called dormitory-city
principle where people could only sleep and stay during night
time.
"As long as people still have to go to the capital city during
the daytime for work, it does not answer the question," he said.
He added that short-sighted developers usually prefer to
construct real estate rather than attempt to help companies
relocate their headquarters in suburban areas.
Other speakers at yesterday's session included Sugianto
Soegijoko, an assistant to the State Minister of National
Development Planning, Soemaroeto, a director of state-owned Bank
Tabungan Negara, Idris Ranadipura, the president of toll road
company PT Marga Mandalasakti, and Mohammad Danisworo, a scholar
at the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB).
The seminar, under the theme Cities Booming in Indonesia, was
organized by the Indonesian Institute of Architects.
The analyst added that a pragmatic approach to relocating
headquarters or high technology industries to suburban areas
offers a more promising and sound lifestyle rather than the
degrading life of the metropolis.
Relocation
The analyst cited as an example a bold decision by the
management of Lippobank, one of the biggest private-run banking
institutions in Indonesia, to relocate its headquarters from
Kuningan, Central Jakarta, to the newly-built Lippo Village in
Tangerang, West Java.
"It will attract thousands of its employees, their families as
well as other fortune seekers to move to the town," he said.
An executive of Lippo Development confirmed that the bank
headquarters will be relocated to the 21-story Asia Tower in
Lippo Village in October.
In a related development, Soegianto said that 25 years from
now Indonesia will have 11 metropolises, each with a population
of more than one million.
The would-be metropolis will include Jakarta (33 million),
Surabaya (9.8 million), Bandung (9.7 million), Medan (5.1
million), Malang (2.9 million), Palembang (2.7 million),
Ujungpandang (2.7 million), Tegal (2.6 million) Semarang (2.5
million), Surakarta (2.2 million), and Yogyakarta (1.6 million).
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