Ending traffic jams

Ending traffic jams

A lot has been written on the causes of traffic jams in
Jakarta. Lack of discipline and too many vehicles, these have
been cited as major causes. I wish to touch upon another reason
which seems correctable to me.

Just a look at the traffic conditions on Jl. Rasuna Said, for
example, brings us face to face with it. Jl. Rasuna Said has five
lanes in each direction, two jalur lambat slow lanes and three
jalur cepat (fast lanes). While the leftmost lane in slowlanes is
clogged due to bus stops, the right lane is clogged by vehicles
trying to make it to the fast lanes. On the other hand, the
leftmost lane is choked with vehicles wanting to get into the
slow lanes and the rightmost lane is choked with traffic trying
to take a U-turn. Thus the only lane (out of total five)
available for a smooth flow of traffic is the middle lane of the
fast lanes.

If the divider between the slow lanes and the fast lanes are
removed, the leftmost and the rightmost of the five lanes would
still be clogged, but we would have three lanes in the center
available for a smooth flow of traffic. The dividers probably
have storm drains below them which will need to be fitted with
necessary heavy-duty grilles which can take the heavy traffic.
Also some leveling will be needed. I think both of these are
quite feasible from a civil engineering point of view.

What I wrote about Jl. Rasuna Said is from my personal
experience but it may be applicable to Jl. Jend. Sudirman, Jl.
Thamrin as well as other major arterial roads of Jakarta too.
On the other hand the traffic on Jalan Gatot Subroto which
doesn't have slow lanes and fast lanes is very smooth compared to
the roads mentioned above.

I am by no means an expert on the traffic flow in Jakarta. But
one must remember that most improvements in the world have come
from user feedback! My comments above should be taken only in
that context.

K.B. KALE

Jakarta