'Toll road will not ease traffic jams'

'Toll road will not ease traffic jams'

Novan Iman Santosa, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The construction of toll roads in the city will not solve
traffic problems as it will encourage more people to buy cars
instead of using public transport, a transportation expert has
said.

"The recommencement of toll road construction will only
provide a better road network for owners of private cars. This,
in turn, will dissuade them from using public transportation,"
Djamester Simarmata of the University of Indonesia (UI) told The
Jakarta Post on Monday.

"Residents can now more easily buy new cars under a variety of
financing schemes provided by car dealers. The construction of
more toll roads will encourage them to buy new vehicles. More
cars on the streets will inevitably mean more traffic
congestion," he added.

President Megawati Soekarnoputri resurrected last Friday 21
toll road projects across the country, worth some Rp 31.6
trillion (US$3.4 billion), with a total length of 576 kilometers
(km).

Included were some 52 km of the Jakarta Outer Ring Road which,
it is believed, will ease traffic congestion in the city.

All the projects were suspended by the government in 1997 as
part of retrenchment measures to cope with the economic crisis.

Simarmata, an urban economics and transportation systems
expert at UI's School of Economics, said the toll road
construction did not meet the needs of the majority of residents.

"What residents badly need is better public transportation,"
he said.

"I really don't understand why the government prefers to
construct toll roads instead of improving the state of public
transport," he added.

Jakarta has four million cars and motorbikes on its 6,500 km
of road. On the other hand, there are 5,411 large buses, 4,981
medium-sized buses and 11,848 public minivans.

Many motorists say that they are reluctant to use public
transportation due to the poor service provided. They also
complain that not only are the vehicles extremely uncomfortable;
they also lack adequate security.

Meanwhile Ofyar Z. Tamin of the Bandung Institute of
Technology (ITB) said that toll road construction would only
provide a short-term solution to the problems of traffic
congestion.

"The toll roads will probably ease traffic congestion in the
short term, but they will create an even bigger problem in the
long run," he said.

"What Jakarta really needs is an integrated public
transportation scheme involving all modes of transportation.

"Even the presence of a mass rapid transit (MRT) system will
not provide a total solution without an integrated scheme," he
said.

Ofyar described MRT as a system capable of transporting 40,000
passengers per hour in a given direction.

"The city administration must improve both its road network
coverage while at the same time increase the capacity of the
existing urban railways," he said.

He also urged the city administration to improve the state of
the existing road network so that if could perform better.

Jakarta's road network takes up 10 percent of the total urban
area, which is the minimum requirement for a city, but the
majority of it does not function properly.

"Many of the streets are occupied by street vendors, as well
as used for parking. Such activities greatly reduce road
capacity.

"It would help a lot if the city administration could free the
streets from such activities. Expanding the road network is very
expensive," he said.

As a rule of thumb, a city needs some 10 percent to 30 percent
of its total area for the road network, he said.

"The construction of toll roads will increase the road network
from the current 10 percent of the total city area. That is the
positive impact of construction," he said.