MRT won't prevent traffic jams: Expert

MRT won't prevent traffic jams: Expert

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The city administration's plan to build a US$ 1.5 billion
subway will not ease traffic congestion unless the public
transportation service is improved and undisciplined street
vendors and motorists removed from the roads, according to a
transportation expert.

"Will the MRT project (alone) solve the problem? That's
nonsense," Ofyar Z. Tamin, from the School of Civil Engineering
at the Bandung Institute of Technology, told The Jakarta Post.

He said that traffic jams occur in Jakarta and some other big
cities in the country because the road capacity is not fully
optimized. Not only do street vendors run their businesses in the
street, there are also many motorists who park their vehicles on
the street.

"In some streets, especially near the shopping areas, only
between 40 percent and 60 percent of the road can be used by
motorists," he said.

He suggested that traffic would be eased if private car owners
took public buses, but that this could only be achieved if the
public transportation were made more comfortable.

Ofyar underlined the need to improve the public transportation
service, because land transportation and an MRT should be
integrated.

Governor Sutiyoso said on Tuesday that daily traffic jams
occurring in many parts of the city were usually caused by too
many private vehicles in the streets.

"The answer to the city's traffic jams is high volume rapid
transport: the subway project," he remarked.

He said the subway project was being discussed at a
ministerial level, hoping that by the end of the year it could be
approved.

"I hope that the project can be started next year," Sutiyoso
said.

The project was first planned in 1995 but then postponed due
to the economic crisis.

Ofyar said that traffic jams could also be relieved by the
extension of existing roads or the construction of new roads,
underpasses or flyovers.

"But they are very costly and need sophisticated technology,"
he said.

The car polling system applied in the city's main roads is
good, he said, but it doesn't really work because many motorists
take "jockeys" from the street as passengers in order to use the
restricted roads.

He hailed the electric train operating in Greater Jakarta but
reminded that the public land transportation service should be
improved because train passengers needed it to deliver them to
their final destinations.