Parking fee for small vehicles

Parking fee for small vehicles

JAKARTA (JP): City Council Commission C for city revenues said
yesterday that the owners of small public transport vehicles
should pay a fee to the municipality for using its parking lots.

The commission chairman, Helmy AR Syihab, said that the owners
have benefited from the lots and should thus pay to maintain
them.

Small public transport vehicles include the city's 14,000
three-wheeled bajaj and more than 1,000 bemo, which are being
phased out. Once out of circulation, the municipality will
collect fees from the minivans expected to replace the bemo.

"An estimated Rp 60 million (US$25.3 million) a year could be
extracted from the parking lots," he said after a meeting with
officials of the city's Land Transport Terminal Body.

However, a councilor from the commission for development
affairs questioned the list of almost 70 sites across five
mayoralties proposed for parking lots.

The sites are outlined and authorized by a 1996 gubernatorial
decree.

"Many of the sites are not parking lots. The vehicles are just
parked on the road," Saud Rachman said. "If fees are collected
this would make their parking legal."

Saud urged the city to review the decree, which aims to
prevent parking outside of authorized areas.

Helmy said the suggestion to collect fees from special parking
lots is expected to boost revenues for the next fiscal year.

Last fiscal year the Terminal Body managed to collect almost
100 percent, or Rp 4.48 billion of its target of Rp 4.57 billion.
The target for the 1996/1997 fiscal year is Rp 6.8 billion, he
said. Terminal fees are collected from passengers, kiosk traders
and drivers.

In response to whether the commission found indications that
next year's target may be too low, Helmy said the meeting with
Terminal Body officials "did no go into details" regarding the
number of passengers, kiosks and vehicles.

The Pulogadung bus station, which is to be replaced by a
larger terminal, accommodates 1,000 city buses serving 63 routes
and 750 inter-city buses plying 39 routes with a combined total
of 28,000 passengers a day.

The commission also said that the Body would be more efficient
if it were separated from the Land Transport and Traffic Control
Agency.

"The Terminal Body should answer directly to the governor, who
could control it better," he said.

Currently the chief of the agency, JP Sepang, also heads the
Terminal Body. (anr)