New supermarket offers midnight shopping
Multa Fidrus, Tangerang
Besides recreational sites and entertainment centers, shopping malls have become an alternative outlet for people living in Greater Jakarta on the weekends.
The increasing popularity of weekend shopping is captured by the management of Hypermarket -- a new supermarket located on the already packed Jl. Raya Serpong, Tangerang regency, west of Jakarta -- which offers a new experience in non-stop shopping for 86 hours from Friday to Monday.
A release from the management offers a midnight shopping experience with special promotions from midnight through 7 a.m., including discounts and gift vouchers for lucky shoppers.
The opening of the new supermarket, and another branch of Carrefour also in Serpong, is in line with the Tangerang regency administration's plan to turn Serpong into an international business center like Orchard Road in Singapore. The administration expects the plan to be materialize in 2008.
"In 2008, Serpong will become the center of an international economic chain outside Jakarta. The existing buildings and infrastructure along Jl. Raya Serpong will help us accelerate the plan to make the area similar to Orchard Road in Singapore," the Tangerang Regency Spatial Planning Agency head Bunyamin Davnie said on Friday.
Apart from international business and shopping centers, Serpong will have family recreational sites, public spaces and open green areas along the 12-kilometer road.
Regent Ismet Iskandar, who chaired the Tangerang Regency Urban Planning Team, said that Serpong, which is also packed with numerous housing estates, was a choice location.
Serpong has the capital Jakarta in the east, the Banten province capital of Serang in the west, Bogor in the south and Tangerang municipality in the north.
"Existing structures along Jl. Raya Serpong built by developers will help the administration in its plans to develop the area," he said, naming real estate developers Bumi Serpong Damai, Lippo Karawaci and Gading Serpong as those involved in the plan.