Trains to holiday getaways fully booked for Christmas

M. Taufiqurrahman, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Tickets for executive trains heading to Yogyakarta, Central Java and East Java from Dec. 24 through Dec. 26 have been sold out for the extended Christmas holiday, with state run PT Kereta Api Indonesia (KAI) seeing a 15 percent increase in the number of passengers compared to regular days.

Cities Bandung, Yogyakarta, Surakarta and Surabaya remained the favorites among holidaymakers.

"All tickets for the executive trains including Argo Bromo, Argo Lawu, Argo Muria and Taksaka, to those destinations, have been sold out. There are still some tickets available for tomorrow," Ismi, a staffer with PT KAI's ticket reservation center on Jl. Juanda, Central Jakarta, told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.

"The Taksaka, bound for Yogyakarta, still has 28 seats while the Argo Lawu bound for Surakarta still has 130 seats," she added.

The government's announcement that it would extend the Christmas holiday to include Friday, plus the weekend, has encouraged Jakartans to go out of town.

The number of passengers leaving Jakarta daily during the Christmas holiday this year has reached around 34,500, a 15 percent increase compared to regular days. However, the figure is less than the Idul Fitri holiday, which saw more than 48,000 passengers leaving the city per day.

Despite the increase in the number of passengers, the head of Gambir railway station, the largest in the city, Besar Susmiarso, said that PT KAI would not step up security measures at train stations and along the railway.

"We did not deploy additional security personnel as we had done during Idul Fitri," he said, adding that PT KAI would cooperate with local police stations along the railroad to maintain security.