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BUS RAPID TRANSPORT (BRT) IN JAKARTA

Brief history about the Metropolitan City of Jakarta

Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, sits on the biggest island of Java which accounts for 60% of the country’s total population. The metropolitan city of Jakarta is home to an estimated 21 million inhabitants, most of them living in the city’s suburbs of Bogor, Depok, Tangrang and Bekasi commonly known as Bodetabek.

1. Over a quarter of Jakarta’s 21 million people live in slum areas. Jakarta is a cosmopolitan city with a myriad of problems which are mostly related to urbanization.
2. The average annual growth of the city is 2% and it is expected to experience an unbelievable growth in 20 years, given the high rate of urbanization.
3. Pollution, space, water, and, worst of all, traffic congestion are the major problems that characterize the cosmopolitan city. In the mid nineties city planners came up with a plan to build Bus Rapid Transport, (BRT), with the aim of easing the problem of traffic congestion.
4. Although the problem is not yet over, the city is on the right track towards finding a lasting solution to a problem that has been very common in many cities of developing nations.

Traffic volume before BRT existed

The traffic was very congested before Bus Rapid Transport (BRT), otherwise known as Mass Rapid Transport (MRT)[v]. The metropolitan city of Jakarta is the home to an estimated 21 million people and has an estimated vehicle population of 5-6 million (Hadar 2010). The city experiences high rate of vehicle growth, which currently stands at 10%. The influx of vehicles has caused a major congestion of traffic on the roads of Jakarta and its outskirts. The roads of Jakarta were crammed with public and private cars and motor cycles which operated in a very disorderly manner worsening the traffic jams which were already a headache. The government was running out of services and a plan was urgently needed to solve the traffic issue.

The problem greatest problem was that traffic was not clearly controlled and there was complete lack of coordination. Undisciplined motorists obstructed traffic anywhere they wanted so long it served their immediate interest. There was a severe shortage of roads in the city, and the problem for more roads was increasing given the increase of vehicle population. The high demand for roads necessitated the optimization of supply and management of demand (Transport Demand Management). This body was supposed to cater for such things as indiscipline among motorists who were the major cause of traffic snarl-ups. There is currently an estimated daytime activity of 3 million people coming from the neighboring suburbs that form the cosmopolitan city. This coupled with the fact that the city has a total passenger trips amounting to 16 million did not make things any easier for traffic management. This number accounts for 51% of public transport and 49% of private transport. This suggests an enormous increase in traffic volume which has been occasioned by the completion of the Bus Rapid Transport.

Most of the time spend on the roads is wasted in traffic jams. This amounts to 60% of the total time a motorist or a passenger spends on average before reaching their destination. This therefore means that if the situation were to improve then a journey that currently takes two hours would be covered in less than an hour in the absence of traffic jams. The situation has not managed to improve as had been earlier predicted mostly due to the fact that the Trans Jakarta has not been fully used for the intended purposes. It was meant for the exclusive use of buses so as to increase on speed as well as efficiency but this is no longer the way things operate. It has become a road just like the previous ones and the normally disorderly medium buses have replaced the big buses in the bus ways. This has increased transport woes.  The construction of the bus rapid transport was an ambitious initiative to solve transport problems by introducing big buses in the fast lanes but cars and medium buses have taken over and besides causing traffic delays, they can not carry as big numbers as the big buses. As a result, the city still experiences shortage of public transport almost to the same level as before[vi].

Road length is 6,630 kilometres and the annual rate of increase is a mere 1% and the length of arterial roads is 1,480 kilometres. This implies that the roads are fewer than the vehicles and a strict management is required to regulate usage and restrict small vehicles to their designated roads to decongest the bus areas[vii]. MRT runs are designed for transport and traffic management so that traffic and transport can be managed in the right way. The transport system is supposed to have schedule, convenience besides being affordable. MRT hopes to regulate the system although it is proving to be a little difficult given the chaotic nature of public transport vehicles. The transport system of BRS is experiencing a high rate of accidents. MRT has unveiled a plan to construct fast lanes which are aimed at providing high travel service to the commuters. This is one of the initiatives that are aimed at finding solutions to the unending traffic woes of Jakarta as it has unveiled a project that is scheduled to serve 36,000 passengers per day in each lane.

The factors influencing the traffic congestion

There are a number of factors that have been the cause of traffic congestion. Motorcycles and cars have been on the increase and as a result traffic woes have increased in some parts of the city. This has led to a proposal by the government to shut some U-Turn points which have been the main contributors to the problem. These are some of the problems which had not been anticipated but which later came to haunt transport authorities even as they thought they had solved the issue of traffic jams. MTR has been somehow part of the problem as it is characterized by a general lack of order[viii]. It has been argued that accessibility should be increased rather than car mobility as people matter more than cars. This has been the case as the residents of this metropolitan city came to terms with the fact that it may be impossible to completely eliminate the traffic jams that are a lot of inconvenience to them as they cause them to lose many work hours[ix].

The greatest advantage with the BRT is that passengers have no difficulties accessing the bus way shelters. This means that the passengers have no problem trying to cross the road so as to reach the buses and as such they do not lose a lot of time waiting for transport to clear so as to cross the road[x].

U-turns are a major cause of traffic congestion. They have been seen as the main cause of traffic jams as they create bottle necks by facilitating the piling up of traffic along busy roads as vehicles block the busy lanes in an attempt to pull in. They cause traffic congestion in traffic jam prone areas as most of them are unnecessary[xi]. This has been so serious such that the transport office in Jakarta has devised new solutions to the unending traffic jams, including the closing of the u-turns that are in the main cause as they are a disruption to traffic flow[xii]. The u-turns slots are far too many. The authorities are planning to reduce them to a maximum of two between traffic lights[xiii].

Private cars are another leading cause of traffic jams in Jakarta. Private cars account for 60% of the total traffic in the city. Most commuters from the city’s suburbs of Bogor, Depok, Tangrang and Bekasi (BODETABEK) mainly use private means to go to their workplace[xiv]. They use cars and motorcycles which are greater than the public service vehicles and this has brought a lot of traffic congestion. The use of private cars has been occasioned by the lack of a reliable public bus transport[xv].

Insufficient roads are the greatest contributor to the traffic woes in Jakarta. Despite the construction of the BRT, very few bus way corridors are in use. This has resulted in small vehicles which are the majority in the city to scrabble with buses and medium buses in the bus way corridors causing a major congestion[xvi]. This has led the city planners to start of thinking about ways in which they can end this problem such as constructing more fast lanes following the example of Bogotá in Colombia, which had for a long time faced a similar problem but now traffic jams are a thing of the pas after bus ways were adopted and traffic issues were permanently dealt with. This problem has been aggravated by the rapid increase in investments whose effect has been an increase in private cars[xvii].

Conclusion

The construction of the BTR may not be an adequate solution in itself and the city authorities should formulate laws that will be used to enforce traffic regulation to end the city’s problems with traffic congestion[xviii]. Small vehicles need to be confined to particular roads to give free passage to buses which carry most of the commuters to the city. Private cars should be required to pay very high rates so as to discourage the owners from using them as they congest the roads unnecessarily while carrying very few people, sometimes even one person[xix].

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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