City to implement 'pedestrianization'

JAKARTA: The city administration has summoned owners of buildings along Jl. Thamrin in Central Jakarta to discuss plans to clear the street of gates, walls and barriers.

Mauritz Napitupulu, head of the City Parks Agency, said the plan was intended to "humanize" the streets and make them more comfortable for pedestrians.

"Please don't call the plan 'breaking down gates'. That gives the impression that the administration is forcing the building owners to clear the barriers. Better to call it 'pedestrianization'. The administration only wants to make the streets more comfortable for pedestrians, like Orchard Road in Singapore," he said.

"Ten days ago, we summoned several owners of buildings on Jl. Thamrin to introduce the idea and the design. A city planning team from the Bandung Institute of Technology, which has been appointed to design the plan, also attended the meeting and explained the idea," he said on Thursday.

However, not all of the owners of buildings on Jl. Thamrin were summoned. "Every building has a different character and architectural style. So we cannot implement a general design for all of them," he said.

Mauritz said the ideal design was "two-four-two", meaning two meters of green area, beside that four meters for the sidewalk, and then another two meters of green area.

He conceded, however, that the administration could not totally implement that design because not all of the buildings had enough land.

He gave the United Nations building as an example. The distance between the building and the street, he said, is not sufficient for the two-four-two design.

As for security concerns, he said the administration was ready to coordinate with the police on the project. --JP