Monorail project not viable now: Activists

Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

As the expiry date of the contract between the city administration and PT Jakarta Monorail draws near without agreement, transportation activists are calling for an end to the agreement, arguing the project is simply not feasible.

Activists from the Indonesia Transportation Society (MTI), the New York-based Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP) and non-governmental organization Pelangi said earlier this week that the project would only force the taxpayers to shoulder the costly endeavor through expensive subsidies.

"The administration should make an evaluation of the contract and look deeper into the possibility of calling off the deal before it gets more difficult for the administration to withdraw from the deal," MTI chairman Bambang Susantono told The Jakarta Post.

Walter Hook of the ITDP concurred with Bambang, saying that the monorail project was not viable.

"I believe that the monorail will serve few people very well and not the majority. But most people will pay for it," Hook said.

Hook said his NGO carried out a survey of 120,000 passengers using public transport along the planned monorail routes and discovered that the demand for the monorail service very low.

ITDP estimated that the monorail's blue line would serve 25,000 passengers daily, while the green line only 7,000 riders, much lower than the 77,562 and 38,650 passengers projected earlier by the Japanese International Cooperation Agency on the Study of Integrated Transportation Master Plan for the Greater Jakarta (SITRAMP).

"The reason why the demand is very low is because the monorail has poor connections with the rest of the public transportation (services) and its fare of Rp 5,000 a single trip is much higher than the bus fares," Hook said.

PT Jakarta Monorail, handpicked to develop the monorail, has requested the city administration help subsidize the monorail project to maintain the fares at an affordable price of Rp 5,000.

It also asked the administration to impose electronic road pricing along the monorail's routes to force motorists to switch from their private cars to monorail cars.

Hook said that he would prefer the busway to the monorail owing to wide difference in the investment costs.

"The construction of one kilometer of busway corridor costs around US$1 million, while the monorail spends at least $58 million per kilometer." Jakarta could develop entire busway routes across the city with the same amount of money earmarked for the monorail project, he said.

Pelangi policy analyst Andi Rahmah, who is also a member of the Jakarta Transportation Council, said the busway outweighed the monorail in terms of sustainability.

"The investment as well as maintenance costs of the busway are much less than the monorail. We don't even need to subsidize the project since the operation of the busway will be able to cover maintenance costs, and even make profits," she said.

The fate of the 28-kilometer monorail project remains unclear, although the concession contract between the administration and its private partner, PT Jakarta Monorail, will expire on May 31.

The agreement was signed on May 31, 2004. Under the agreement, signed by Governor Sutiyoso and JM president director Ruslan Diwiryo, the company is required to complete a financial close within a year, which could be extended for another six months. Beyond that, the two parties may have to sign another agreement.

Sutiyoso said that he would extend the contract to give more time for the company to close a deal with potential financiers.