The sensation of traveling on cheap W. Java trains

JAKARTA (JP): Willing to experience the worst means of transportation in the city? Just take trains plying short distances to neighborhood areas in West Java.

Poor service in that segment of the transportation business is rampant -- filthy carriages, odoriferous toilets, lack of electricity, broken seats and schedule unpunctuality.

But that low-cost transportation is the only alternative for those who have limited budgets.

For instance, one needs only Rp 900 (10 US cents) for a journey as far as Rangkasbitung, about 130 kilometers west from here, and Bogor, about 60 kilometers south of here; and only Rp 600 for a train ticket to Tangerang, about 20 kilometers west of here.

Compared with bus transportation, one would pay thousands of rupiah for the same routes.

However, commuters receive poor treatment during the journey as the consequence for being poor and having to take the train.

Last week, for instance, hundreds of the Jakarta-Rangkasbitung train passengers were stuck inside the carriages for about half an hour in the middle of a grass field sparsely populated with shanties. The train had only traveled about one kilometer from the Kota railway station.

"It's something usual," said senior passenger Sawilaningsih, in an effort to comfort herself and others.

"The delay is to make way for other trains to pass," added the 63-year-old regular passenger while commenting on the common occurrence on the single railway track.

But she later admitted that usually it did not wait such a long time.

The passengers started to breathe happily when the train started to move again. But not for long because the train was moving backward toward the station!

That was it, passengers would wait for another half hour before the diesel-operated train really started the journey.

Responding to a commuter's question, a ticket controller said that the parking area at Kota railway station should have been used by another locomotive and the Jakarta-Rangkasbitung train would step aside "for a while".

While waiting, the passengers also had to endure the unbearable heat inside the carriages due to broken fans and crowded passengers.

One can experience another experience by taking a night trip and witness light supplied from candles brought by vendors who past them in used plastic cups of mineral water.

Such poor conditions are not experienced only on the Jakarta- Rangkasbitung train but also on others, like trains plying the route of Jakarta-Bekasi, about 40 kilometers east of here, and the Jakarta-Tangerang train, in which almost all of the neon lamps were broken.

But people do not see any efforts from the state-owned railway company PT Kereta Api Indonesia to repair them.

"The darkness is a favorite situation for pickpockets. I once lost my wallet during a night trip," said Asep, a resident of Kranji area, Bekasi.

Pickpockets and robbers are also on the list of experiences passengers can suffer on the trains. And unfortunately, those are becoming something usual for passengers.

Sometimes crimes occur during midday, like what happened on the Jakarta-Rangkasbitung train on Saturday.

A man, wearing neat clothes, grabbed a box with a compact disc rack inside and easily jumped from the train, having just departed Kota station and still moving slowly. The man easily fled through broken iron fences at the sides of the railway.

"Usually the criminals make use of the train's slow movement so they can flee easily without being chased. I have witnessed such incidents many times," said Suherman, who claimed to have escaped from bad fortune on three occasions.

Yet, people continue to take such trains and are unwilling to take alternative means of transportation like buses.

"Trains are the simplest and cheapest means of transportation. If I took the bus I should change vehicles several times from Tanah Abang (Central Jakarta) where I work, to my house," said Enday Supriatna, a fruit seller from Tangerang. (ind)