City greening budget slashed

Tifa Asrianti and Mustaqim Adamrah , The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Thu, 03/06/2008 12:00 PM | City

Governor Fauzi Bowo said Wednesday the administration would likely be unable to meet the target for green areas in Jakarta after the City Council cut Rp 2.6 billion from the city budget's greening program.

"The administration can't create green spaces if it doesn't have the funds," he said.

The city parks agency planned to create green spaces at 29 different gas station sites, including two newly renovated stations on Jl. Jenderal Sudirman, South Jakarta, and two stations under legal dispute on Jl. Hayam Wuruk, West Jakarta.

However, the agency's proposed budget of Rp 2.6 billion (US$286,900), initially planned to cover the greening program forgas stations, was rejected by the City Council during final deliberations on the 2008 city budget.

In a previous city budget draft, the administration planned to relocate 28 gas stations to create 42,697 square meters of green areas. In the final draft, the administration decided to relocate one more gas station, making the total 29.

The city expected to get about 100,000 square meters of new green areas this year by relocating residents and gas stations. According to a city budget draft, the relocation of residents alone would have created 55,540 square meters of green areas, at a cost of Rp 27.3 billion to carry out.

The city hopes to expand green areas from the current 9.6 percent to 13.94 percent of Jakarta's 63,744 hectares by 2010.

However, the city's mining agency said Jakarta still needs more gas stations for its 5 million motorized vehicles.

"Singapore has around 800,000 vehicles and 216 gas stations, while Jakarta has more than 5 million vehicles and only 273 gas stations. Based on those figures, we estimate that Jakarta needs around 1,000 gas stations," Ratna Suratni, head of the oil, gas, electricity and energy division at the Jakarta Mining Agency, said Tuesday.

She explained the figure was not absolute as different gas stations had different capacities and could serve a varying number of people.

If one gas station has the capacity of two or three gas stations, there is no need for any more in the area, she said.

While some areas have numerous gas stations, Ratna said in other regions such facilities were hard to find.

Darmuji Ketot, an employee at a property company in Kelapa Gading, North Jakarta, said he once ran out of gas on Jl. Gusti Ngurah Rai I, East Jakarta, because he could not find a gas station along the road.

"There is only one gas station on that road but it is located on the opposite side and it was difficult to make a U-turn. I had to buy gasoline at a kiosk," the resident of Bekasi said.

However, Leo Faraytody, an employee at a private company, said he never ran out of gas because his daily route included Jl. Pemuda, Jl. Pramuka, Jl. Diponegoro and Jl. Sudirman.

"Those roads have a lot of gas stations on both sides of the road, so I never have problems with fuel supply," he said.

Bowo Saroso, head of the energy usage division, said the agency would regulate how many gas stations an area needed, calculated from the population number, the number of vehicles and the amount of gasoline sold at nearby stations.

"We estimate that each Jakarta municipality needs 375 kiloliters of gasoline per year, while the whole of Jakarta needs 3.49 million kiloliters per year. But we haven't figured out how many gas stations are needed," he said.

Comments (0) | Post comment

A | A | A |