Gridlock
How many times a day do we gripe about traffic in the capital? Despite our protestations and grumblings, most Jakartans despair in silence without ever making their grievances heard.
"Its a fact of life," we tell ourselves. "There's nothing we can do about it," we convince ourselves.
Rather than putting our heads together, we each pursue our own little solutions that in the end only makes overall conditions worse.
Many equip their vehicles with luxuries such as mini- television sets or other electronic amenities, while others opt for regular "pit stops" to cafes or bars on their commute home. Chauffeurs are another option that allows the lucky employer to doze off on his/her way to their destination.
Meanwhile, remedies undertaken by the City administration seem haphazard and often only aggravate the traffic situation rather than relieve it.
Take the Trans Jakarta busway. It has grown in popularity and during rush hours the buses are packed full.
But has it actually relieved congestion? We think not.
Side roads are clogged with cars avoiding the three-in-one rule. Furthermore, the allocation of one lane exclusively for the busway has only reduced the capacity of Jakarta's main throughway to absorb traffic.
A recent study has highlighted the depressing prospects for future traffic conditions in the city. Average traveling speed in 2020 will be a snail's pace of just 10 kilometers per hour. Travel time will increase by over 50 percent.
Over 2.5 million cars and 3.8 million motorcycles are already fighting for space on the city's 7,500 kilometers of road. No relief is in sight, with an estimated 300 new cars and 1,200 new motorcycles hitting the streets daily.
As if that wasn't enough, in less than a decade we could all be spending more time on the road than we do at work or at home.
Smog, depreciating the quality of our health, lost opportunities and time. All because we did not think ahead and find a comprehensive solution to this seemingly intractable problem of traffic.
One study estimates that material losses due to traffic congestion already amount to Rp 12.32 trillion per year. That is the equivalent to Rp 41.05 billion a day. Imagine the hundreds of thousands of hungry people we could feed with such money!
Simply put, the situation has become ridiculous.
It does not make sense to spend over an hour to reach a destination that is less than 10 kilometers away.
Unfortunately, there are no simple quick-fixes to this problem. Summarily imposing restrictions on vehicle ownership or alternating allowable use of vehicles is a cruel policy if the city itself cannot provide adequate public transport facilities.
Though an increasing number of professionals are utilizing the busway, many more are apprehensive about the facilities that take them from their suburban complexes to the busway's main intersection points. Even where there are 'feeder' routes available, people often have to fight just to get into the jam- packed vehicles.
For such people, it is still better to fight through the traffic in one's own comfortable car, than physically jostle with other people under the scorching sun or in heavy rain for an inch of dangling space, with pickpockets lurking everywhere waiting for an opportunity.
Well-off parents frequently purchase second or third cars rather than have their children exposed to the harsh tribulations of getting to school using public transport.
Piecemeal solutions like the busway, the three-in-one corridors, and the planned monorail are unlikely to alleviate, let alone solve, our daily traffic misery.
It's not just about the traffic or of building rapid mass- transport systems. It's also about Jakarta dispersing and possibly reallocating future developments to the outskirts of the city so that people will not flock into just one area; it is about the police being able to create a safer environment so public transport users will not fear being mugged; it is about real estate developers constructing satellite towns which are truly independent in terms of basic infrastructure.
More importantly, it is also about ourselves, gallantly relinquishing luxuries such as our car and opting for the bus, the train or even the bicycle.