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Public transportation only hope to tackle motorcycle boom
The Jakarta administration must work quickly to build a credible public transportation network if it is to curb the rising number of motorcycles in the capital, which are now as numerous the city's residents, experts say
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he Jakarta administration must work quickly to build a credible public transportation network if it is to curb the rising number of motorcycles in the capital, which are now as numerous the city's residents, experts say.
Ellen S. W. Tangkudung, a transportation expert from the University of Indonesia, said Friday she blamed the city's poor public transportation network for the ballooning number of motorcycles.
"People would probably not switch to use private vehicles if public transportation was reliable," she said.
She said motorcycle numbers had been increasing for six years throughout the country, driven by affordable credit schemes.
Today, a new motorcycle can be purchased with an initial down payment of Rp 500,000 (US$50).
She said the city administration must improve public transportation, including by allocating a higher budget to procure public transportation vehicles.
"*At the moment* the city can only supply a subsidy for fuel and spare parts to provide an affordable public transportation service," she said.
More than 890 motorcycles are registered every day on average in Jakarta, according to Jakarta Police data.
As of May, there were 8,087,118 registered motorcycles in the city, just short of the number of people living here, which was 8.5 million as of May, according to the City Population and Civil Registration Agency.
Police data shows that about 1 million new motorcycles are registered every year.
This extraordinarily high number of motorcycles has exacerbated the city's already awful traffic, especially during rush hour. Matters become even worse when it rains and motorcyclists seek shelter under overpasses or bridges as evidenced this week when scores of motorcyclists stopped under a bridge on Jl. Sudirman, Central Jakarta, causing heavy congestion.
Chairman of the Indonesian Motorcycle Industry Association Gunadi Sindhuwinata said that his association did not have any plans to limit or reduce the number of motorcycles in the city.
"It's impossible to control the number of motorcycles," he said.
He said there were about 35 million motorcycles that were in usable condition in the country, and that 6 million to 7 million of those were in Greater Jakarta.
"Not all of the motorcycles recorded by the police are still operational. Some of them may be broken," he said.
He said his association had actually recorded a decrease in the percentage of motorcycles being sold in the capital.
"Over the past 10 years, the change has been from 30 to 20 percent in 2009," he said.
He said his association has recorded growing sales in other provinces, including Bali and West Papua.
