Fees raised to keep cars off the street

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The city administration plan to triple the price of on-street parking is aimed at encouraging motorists to keep their vehicles at home in order to ease traffic congestion in the city, an official says.

"We hope there will be less cars on the streets if we impose high parking prices, and people will use more public transportation," said deputy head of city parking operator BP Parkir Bambang Rahmanto after a meeting with the City Council's Commission C for financial affairs.

Executives of BP Parkir were summoned by the commission on Friday to shed light on the planned parking hikes.

Currently, the price of on-street parking is Rp 1,000 (US$0.1) per hour. The new price will be Rp 3,000 for the first hour and Rp 2,000 for each following hour.

Governor Sutiyoso also agreed to the plan on Friday, saying that the current price was way too low compared to other world cities. He claimed that New York had prices of US$10 per hour (about Rp 90,000) for such parking.

Deputy chairman of Commission C Pria Ramadhani said councillors had not made a decision on BP Parking's requests, saying that more meetings were needed to discuss various issues, including efficiency in operation of the company.

Currently, there are around 4.5 million vehicles in the city, mostly private cars. The administration blames the large number of private cars for the traffic congestion.

Bambang said the planned hike of on-street parking was part of an overall traffic master plan, which includes the three-in-one traffic policy imposed along the busway corridor from Blok M in South Jakarta to Kota.

"If we earn more revenue from the price increase, it will be good," he added.

According to Pria, city revenue from on-street parking should reach Rp 19 billion this year.

If the proposal is approved, the city may earn Rp 29 billion from on-street parking. Meanwhile, the city budget has allocated Rp 17 billion for BP Parkir.