Price study delays subway project
Price study delays subway project
JAKARTA (JP): The municipality has yet to complete its study
on the fares for the city's subway, causing further delays to the
US$2.3 billion transportation project.
The head of the City's Development Planning Board, Budihardjo
Soekmadi, said yesterday the administration was still studying
the tariffs proposed by its project partner.
"There's still a need to negotiate affordable fares with
them," Budihardjo, who is one of the city officials in charge of
the scheme, told The Jakarta Post.
The project, to be built jointly by the city administration
and a consortium of private investors from three countries, is
expected to begin soon after the negotiations between the two
parties on the proposed fares are completed.
"At the moment, we can't yet submit the proposed fares because
our study and the negotiations are still in progress," said
Budihardjo.
The municipality, he said, wanted to set the fares at Rp 1,800
(63 U.S. cents) per person per trip, which it considered
affordable for most commuters.
But this was well below the consortium's suggested fare of Rp
5,000. The private companies said this would be viable by the
time the subway started operating in 2001, said Budihardjo.
As a comparison, the current fare on air-conditioned buses,
the most modern mass land transportation means in the city, is Rp
1,800 per person per trip.
No date
On Monday, Minister of Transportation Haryanto Dhanutirto
urged the municipality to immediately present its proposed fares
to him to prevent the project being further delayed.
The ministry, also in charge of determining all public
transportation fares except minivans and air-conditioned buses
will consider fare proposals from both the administration and the
consortium before it makes a decision.
Budihardjo said the consortium and the administration would
submit their agreed proposed fares to the ministry as soon as
possible, without giving a specific date.
The consortium, IJEG, consists of Indonesian, Japanese and
European companies. An agreement to build the project was signed
by the consortium and the municipality two years ago.
The Indonesian investors are led by businessman Aburizal
Bakrie of PT Bakrie Investindo, while the Japanese companies are
led by Itochu Corp. Germany's Ferrostaal AG heads the European
firms.
The 14.5-kilometer project connecting Blok M in South Jakarta
and downtown Kota was initially scheduled to start in April and
was then delayed indefinitely.
Bakrie, told the Post in Bangkok last month that there was
also disagreement on several items in the project's financial
proposal.
Deputy Governor of Economic and Administrative Affairs Tb.M.
Rais said last Wednesday that the consortium had submitted a new
scheme expected to solve the project's financial constraints.
He said that no decision had been made on the new scheme
because it would first be presented to Governor Surjadi
Soedirdja. He declined to give further details.
The 17-station subway is an initial step in a long-term plan
to ease the city's chaotic traffic problems. (ste)