T

he city administration has planned to build green high-rise office buildings and merge its agencies to provide land for green spaces.

Governor Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo said the city planned to demolish all low-rise office buildings and relocate the agencies to new high-rise buildings.

'€œIn the future we will build high-rise and green buildings and relocate agencies to the new buildings. The old low-rise buildings will be demolished to provide land to build public parks and green spaces,'€ Jokowi told reporters during an inspection of a nearly-finished 16-story office tower in Jatibaru, Central Jakarta on Thursday.

The new office tower, expected to be ready by the end of this year, will accommodate three agencies, namely the Construction Supervision and Regulation Agency (PPB), the Public Works Agency and the Transportation Agency, whose current offices are located in the same compound, which occupies 3.5 hectares of land, along with three other agencies: the Energy and Industry Agency, the National Land Agency Jakarta chapter and the Jakarta Housing and Administrative Buildings Agency.

The new office tower was built on a 19,720-square-meter area within the compound.

'€œAfter we demolish the old office buildings, we will have adequate land to build public parks,'€ Jokowi said.

Jakarta Housing and Administrative Building Agency head Yonathan Pasodung said that the city would build another tower after the first tower was finished.

'€œThere will be two office towers here. The next one will be built right after this one is completed. It may start next year,'€ he said, declining to elaborate on the details regarding the budget.

He pointed out that the office tower was built with green concepts.

'€œWe have built water treatment facilities in the compound to recycle water,'€ he said, adding that the tower area would have 10 percolation pits.

Jokowi also instructed the agency to use conblocks instead of asphalt to pave the road.

'€œWe should lead by example,'€ Jokowi said.

The governor pointed out that the city also aimed to tear down city-owned training centers and build a new integrated training center in Kuningan, South Jakarta.

Earlier this year, Deputy Governor Basuki '€œAhok'€ Tjahaja Purnama led a meeting on the plan. The existing training centers were planned to be converted to public facilities and low-cost apartments for people currently squatting on riverbanks.

Buildings to be included in the plan include an office of the Social Agency on Jl. Gunung Sahari, Central Jakarta, an office of the Manpower Agency on Jl. Prapatan, Central Jakarta, a unit office in Cijantung, East Jakarta, a building belonging to the Tourism and Culture Agency on Jl. Kuningan Barat in South Jakarta, a regional library building on Jl. Cikini Raya, Central Jakarta, and office buildings belonging to the Education Agency on Jl. Gatot Subroto in South Jakarta.

The combined area of land that will be made available for low-cost apartments will be more than 30,000 square meters.

The planned administrative building will be built on a 21,245-square-meter site in Kuningan, South Jakarta, and will have up to 50 floors.

Ahok said that the integration of training centers would also mean more effective human resources development planning.

The city administration under Jokowi aimed to boost the amount of open green space in the capital to 30 percent of its total land area, as mandated by the national law. Jakarta has not yet been able to meet the requirement because of rampant squatting, as well as the previous administrations'€™ preference to convert land into commercial areas instead of public parks.