T

he city administration announced Thursday that it will go ahead with its plan to implement the "5-bonus-1" on-street parking policy, which rewards motorists who park in the same area for five days with one free day, despite the failure of its pilot project.

"We hope that with the new policy we can better monitor parking revenue," City Vice Governor Prijanto said at City Hall.

"It *the policy* will allow the administration to control how many tickets are issued every day and cross-check the report with that made by parking unit under the City Transportation Agency," he added.

Prijanto claimed that Governor Fauzi Bowo had given his consent to the implementation of the policy across the capital.

He did not, however, say when the new policy would take effect.

Under the policy, motorists who park their vehicles on the same street five times will get a free day of parking, as long as they can produce parking tickets to the parking attendants.

The administration first introduced the policy on Feb. 4 on four streets: Jl. Pecenongan and Jl. Juanda in Central Jakarta, Jl. Boulevard Raya in North Jakarta and Jl. Raden Patah in South Jakarta.

The Jakarta Post, however, observed that the trial of the policy was a flop as many parking attendants would not hand over the tickets. They oppose the new ruling, saying that it reduces their income.

According to the city's financial bureau, targets for parking revenue are routinely not met. The administration set a benchmark of Rp 26.40 billion (US$ 2.4 million) last year, but just 42 percent of this amount was raised. Similarly, 42 percent of the 2007 target of Rp 45.79 billion was raised.

Prijanto called on motorists to insist on receiving the tickets to make the policy work.

"At the end of the day we hope we can ensure that the parking unit gives a correct report on parking revenue," he said.