Extra buses allowed for Idul Fitri holiday

Extra buses allowed for Idul Fitri holiday

JAKARTA (JP): The directorate general of land transportation
has agreed to allow bus transportation companies to operate extra
buses during the upcoming Idul Fitri celebration.

According to Director General Soejono, the additional buses
are allowed to pick up passengers at certain places without
having to go to the terminals.

"We have arranged a number of reserve bus terminals but if
there are a great number of passengers at a certain place, buses
can pick them up without having to go to the terminals," Soejono
said on Thursday.

"Under such a system, bus transportation firms won't have
additional transportation costs. It will also ease the flow of
traffic in the city," he said.

"It's effective, efficient and economical," Soejono said.

He said the only thing the bus companies will have to do is
coordinate the buses schedules and file the schedules with
officers at Soejono's office.

According to the estimated figures provided by local
authorities, a total of about two million from the over 10
million Jakarta population will leave the city to celebrate the
Moslem Idul Fitri festivities, which this year probably will fall
on March 3 and 4.

The Idul Fitri holidays may attract many Jakarta residents to
leave the city as March 5 is a Sunday.

As was reported earlier, the City Land Transportation Agency
will deploy over 7,000 buses in a 16-day operation in
anticipation of the "explosion" in the number of passengers
during and after the holidays.

The operation will begin on Feb. 24 and last through March 11.

"I predict that the number of homebound travelers will be 10
percent higher than last year," said head of the agency, J.P.
Sepang.

Last year there were about 1.49 million homebound travelers
who used public transportation at Idul Fitri.

"Two days before Idul Fitri will be the peak of the exodus,"
he said, predicting that a total of 158,301 people will leave the
city on that day alone. (bsr)