Sunardi builds city with patience
Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
As an angler, Sunardi Rusli, 62, has learned to endure hours of waiting in the hope of hooking the big one.
That patience, and a simple but well thought-out plan, has made him one of the most successful developers in the country.
Sunardi was an architecture lecturer at Tarumanegara University when he joined PT Summarecon Agung in the 1970s.
Together with Soetjipto Nagaria (now chief commissioner of the publicly-listed property company), he started to develop the swampy area of Kelapa Gading in North Jakarta.
"What I had in mind at that time was to transform the swamp into a low-cost housing complex for the residents of Senen, Central Jakarta, whose homes had been affected by the development of the Senen trade center," he said.
His simple plan expanded beyond all expectations.
After 30 years, the company -- where he has been a project manager since 1978 and president director since 1999 -- has managed to develop not only a 10-hectare low-cost residential complex in which each house was priced at Rp 70 million, but also a 500-hectare prestigious residential area with full facilities, including sports centers, hospitals, restaurants and malls.
Now, the lowest price of a house in the area is about Rp 700 million.
He recalls how he spent his time filling in the swamp, which was between 1.7 meters and 3.5 meters deep, with soil from Bogor and Bekasi.
"That was challenging work, especially on rainy days, as we had to do everything manually using our bare hands and pushcarts as there were no proper roads in the area," he said.
In the early 1980s, the clusters of houses started to spread across the complex. However, it was still sparsely populated and only a few Jakartans were aware of its existence.
"I remember having lunches at some big restaurants across the city and handing out invitations to the owners to open new branches here. Some of them would stare at us in a daze and then asked, 'Kelapa Gading? Are there any houses there?'" he recalled, chuckling.
Some of the restaurant branches set up as a result still survive today, even though the parent restaurants have shut down, he said proudly, highlighting how the complex has become the perfect location for a restaurant business.
"The development of a wet market was the second priority as the nearest such market was in Rawamangun, East Jakarta, which was too far away for the residents to do their daily shopping," Sunardi said.
He gathered the vegetable vendors, who used to sell their goods in pushcarts around the neighborhoods, and offered them vending spaces in the area. He himself trained the traders how to serve and to package their products so as to attract buyers.
As the company also provided the traders with cargo trucks to procure fruit and vegetables from producing areas outside the capital, the traditional market grew rapidly.
The market paved the way for the establishment of shopping malls and retail outlets in the complex early in the 1990s.
Currently, at least 11 shopping centers and malls compete with each other to win the custom of the residents, who occupy 25,000 houses and 2,000 shophouses in the area.
"You know what really makes an architect happy? It's to witness his plan being fulfilled. And, I feel happy when I look at Kelapa Gading. I've spent years on it. It just like keeping quiet while fishing and waiting for the big one to come along," Sunardi said.