Jakarta authorities told to reroute the new busway

Damar Harsanto, Jakarta

Amid concern that many trees would be cut to make way for the new busway corridor, a transportation expert of the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) urged the Jakarta administration to seek an alternative route to minimize the number of trees removed.

"If the planned route, which aims to improve the city's transportation system, causes major damages to other sectors, then the plan is not feasible. It would be better for the administration to seek an alternative," Ofyar Z. Tamin told The Jakarta Post by phone.

Ofyar was commenting on the administration's plan to cut down around 1,600 trees along the 33-kilometer corridor from Kalideres in West Jakarta to Pulogadung in East Jakarta.

According to him, the felling of trees for the project must be minimal.

"At times, it is unavoidable to cut down trees, specially when we face technical problems in the field. But the administration must guarantee that each tree felled is replaced with a new one," he said.

Jakarta Parks Agency's green area division head Mochamad Setyadi, however, estimated that only 230 trees would be cut down to make way for the new busway corridor.

"We will try to move the rest of the trees to other locations nearby. We are trying to see if we can uproot a big tree without killing it," he said.

Assistant to the city secretary for development affairs IGKG Suena promised that the administration would replace each tree it felled with 10 new ones.

"We will move the small trees to other places, if we can," he told the Post, without giving details.

The administration was criticized for cutting several trees on the median strips for the construction of the first 12.9- kilometer busway corridor from Blok M in South Jakarta to Kota in West Jakarta. No progress report was available to determine whether the administration had planted new trees to replace the ones it cut down.

The Jakarta Public Works Agency had earlier planned to widen the fast lanes of Jl. Jend. Sudirman and Jl. M.H. Thamrin to create an additional lane for private cars as one of the lanes was taken over by the busway. The plan was dropped as the project would involve uprooting 16 trees, 128 street light poles and 137 traffic light control boxes.

The administration has estimated that the infrastructure for the construction of the new busway corridor would cost up to Rp 600 billion (US$64.5 million). The hefty figure excludes the cost of the new buses that are expected to cost around Rp 1 billion each -- more expensive than the first busway buses which were Rp 830 million each.

Aside from the expansion to the busway network, the administration will also initiate a monorail project this year to help ease chronic traffic congestion in the city and encourage motorists to switch to public transportation.