Jakarta traffic woes

Jakarta traffic woes

The Jakarta administration's efforts to deal with the city's
traffic woes deserves the close attention of the public.
Unfortunately, the many policies that are supposed to support the
efforts have been contradictory. The seemingly haphazard issuance
of operation permits for public transportation vehicles could be
cited as an example of those contradictory efforts to curb
congestion.

Ironically, therefore, Jakarta's public transportation system
has become a serious problems in the streets. While police and
other agencies in charge of supervising public order have never
taken any adequate action against traffic violators.

Irritating as it is, the public transportation system is just
a small part of the city's traffic problems.

The key to resolving all those problems lies with the
government, first of all the Jakarta City Administration. The
fact that the teeming city is too crowded with vehicles must not
become an excuse for allowing the chaos to continue.

Unfortunately, it seems that the Jakarta administration is too
frustrated to deal with the deteriorating traffic situation.
Construction of new roads has already been shown to be
ineffective in curing the problem. In the view of many, the
situation has already become too chaotic to regulate.

The mass rapid transport system (MRT) that was planned to
serve the busy route linking Blok M in South Jakarta and Kota in
the downtown area is believed by experts to be the best remedy.
But so far, the MRT concept is little more than a hotly debated
issue in discussions and seminars, but has yet to materialize.

In the meantime, while waiting for some inspiration from above
on how to deal with the traffic chaos, the city administration
introduced the so-called three-in-one scheme, which prohibits
private cars carrying fewer than three people from entering
certain major streets in designated zones, including Jl. Jend.
Sudirman, Jl. Rasuna Said (Kuningan), Jl. MH Thamrin and Jl.
Gatot Subroto thoroughfares from 6:30 a.m. to 10 a.m.

While the three-in-one program has not proven to be
successful, the administration is planning a busway system,
adopted from Bogota, Colombia.

Despite its vigor in introducing the busway system, the city
administration has yet to take any concrete steps to realize it,
which is, in all honesty, not yet very clear even to City Hall
officials, including Governor Sutiyoso. That is why Sutiyoso is
planning to travel to Bogota by the end of this month to "broaden
their knowledge" about the system.

For now, as none of the cures have been proven effective, the
authorities plan to extend the three-in-one system, which has
been on trial for 11 years and has been proven to be a failure.
For one thing, the three-in-one system has failed to curb the
volume of private cars entering the restricted zones as drivers
can easily hire people -- popularly known as "jockeys" - to meet
the requirement of having three passengers, driver included, in
one car.

Given all that has been said, it would seem that the time has
come for the Jakarta authorities to let common wisdom speak. If
the main obstacle that has hampered the 11-year-old system is
"jockeys", why is it that the authorities have failed to control
them? And what drives the authorities to decide to extend the
three-in-one system to the evening hours, from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m?
Isn't that a clear indication that the administration is getting
more and more frustrated?

Under those circumstances Sutiyoso would merely underline the
controversial nature of his policies if he agreed to the plan.
About his widely criticized plan for the reclamation of Jakarta's
north coastal, Sutiyoso said that Jakarta could learn from Tokyo
and Singapore, both of which boast successful land reclamation
projects.

Now, while persisting in his bus way project, he looks towards
Bogota. Learning from the success stories of other big cities is
certainly a prerequisite for Jakarta's proper development.
However, it must be kept in mind that here it is not merely a
technical matter. Non-technical matters have become the main
constraints in almost all of Jakarta's development programs.

The culture and the mentality of Jakarta's residents is
totally different from that of the population of Tokyo, Singapore
and Bogota. The working ethos of officials in Jakarta, Tokyo,
Bogota and Singapore is different, and the corrupt mentality of
most of our officials is an already public secret.

In brief, we can expect nothing from any program launched by
the government unless corruption, collusion and nepotism are
eradicated. Jakarta's traffic problems are not just a result of
the number of vehicles plying its roads. They are as much caused
by violations of zoning plans, poor law enforcement, corrupt
officials and the lack of discipline among citizens, further
complicated by political matters.

Indifference and lack of capability on the part of our
decision makers is also hampering the efforts to ease the city's
traffic woes. How, for example, can the authorities decide to
extend the three-in-one system if it has already been proven
ineffective? Aren't there any other popular, more effective
alternatives open?

Given all these facts, it seems that the only option open to
Jakarta's residents at present is to accept that their city's
traffic will remain chaotic for at least the coming decade,
because the administration's policies to do the best it can for
the people does not seem to be backed up by proper, careful and
reasonable planning.

For the moment, we can only dream about seeing traffic on
Jakarta's streets that is smooth, orderly and civilized, because
an effective formula for easing the chaos on the streets if still
far from reality.