Busway feeder service failure admitted
Busway feeder service failure admitted
Bambang Nurbianto and Damar Harsanto, Jakarta
The TransJakarta Busway management admits that it has failed to
provide feeder services for the 12.9-kilometer busway corridor
from Blok M, South Jakarta, to Kota, West Jakarta.
Management head Irzal Djamal said on Tuesday that eight bus
operators did not provide an adequate number of feeder services,
as specified in an agreement signed between them earlier.
"I have already warned the operators about the small number of
passengers buying combination tickets for the feeder and the
busway. We shall evaluate their performance after their contract
expires next month," Irzal told The Jakarta Post.
The eight operators are Metromini, Kopaja, Steady Safe,
Bianglala, state-owned PPD, Kopami, Pahala Kencana and Mayasari
Bhakti.
Data from the management shows that the 383 feeder buses owned
by the eight operators have accommodated only a few hundred
passengers, although the number of busway passengers is around
62,000 people per day.
Irzal claimed that the failure was because bus crews preferred
to accept cash from feeder pedestrians instead of tickets as
provided by the busway management.
However, PPD spokesman Safrudin Dahlan refuted Irzal's
statement, saying that the bus operators did not receive any
benefit by providing feeder services, as there was no clear
statement of responsibilities of the operators and the busway
management.
He added that the failure was also sparked by few passengers
willing to buy feeder tickets.
The busway management has prepared two types of feeder buses:
air-conditioned buses, whose fare is Rp 3,900 (42 U.S. cents) and
non-air-conditioned buses, which charge Rp 2,900.
The feeder bus concept differed from the plan as originally
conceived, in which the management planned to categorize buses
based on zoning.
The management has also yet to decommission other buses whose
routes overlap that of the busway.
Despite a failure to provide adequate feeder services, the
city transportation agency has insisted on starting construction
of the second busway corridor from Kalideres, West Jakarta, to
Pulogadung, East Jakarta.
"We shall proceed with the (second corridor) project, no
matter what critics say," agency head Rustam Effendy Sidabutar
said.
He also rejected any significant changes to the planned
corridor, including a recommendation from a transportation expert
to reroute the corridor due to major damage that would be caused
by the project.
"There will be no significant changes; the decision is final."
The estimated cost of the second corridor infrastructure
totals Rp 600 billion.
"The agency is responsible for building bus stops and
pedestrian bridges for the project, which will cost around Rp 369
billion," he said.
The city public works agency and city parks agency will be
responsible for the establishment of lanes and median strips
along the corridor.
Rustam acknowledged that the new corridor budget would be
higher than that for the first project due to technical
difficulties in the field. "Some parts of the planned corridor
have only two lanes, with others three. We must sort that out
prior to implementation of the busway."
The agency also plans the construction of two other new
corridors: Pulogadung, East Jakarta, to Hotel Indonesia, Central
Jakarta, in 2006, and Kampung Rambutan, East Jakarta, to Tanjung
Priok, North Jakarta, in 2007.