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Jakarta Post

1.38 million commute into Jakarta daily

A commuter survey conducted by the Jakarta branch of the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) has revealed that 2

Indra Budiari (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, February 17, 2015

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1.38 million commute into Jakarta daily

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commuter survey conducted by the Jakarta branch of the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) has revealed that 2.43 million commuters travel within, into and out of the city daily.

Of these, 1.38 million travel from the outskirts of Jakarta, comprising the cities of Bogor, Bekasi and Depok in West Java and Tangerang in Banten, into the capital.

Bekasi topped the list as the largest source of commuters from outside the capital at 14.8 percent of the total number of commuters, followed by Depok at 11.68 percent and South Tangerang at 8.68 percent.

BPS Jakarta head Nyoto Widodo said 70 percent of commuters from outside Jakarta used private cars or motorcycles rather than public transportation when commuting into the city.

'€œMore than half of the commuters use private vehicles, that'€™s why we see congestion in Jakarta almost every day,'€ Nyoto said at the BPS Jakarta office in Salemba, Central Jakarta, on Monday.

Based on the survey, 58 percent of commuters use motorcycles to get to Jakarta, 12.8 percent use cars and only 27 percent use public transportation such as buses, Transjakarta and feeders (APTB) and commuter trains.

The commuters mostly traveled to Central Jakarta, South Jakarta and North Jakarta.

Although Jakarta is home to 10.1 million people in the evening, the number of commuters boosts the capital'€™s population to 11.2 million people during the day.

While 1.38 million commuters travel in from the city'€™s outskirts, only 255,986 Jakarta residents worked, studied or ran businesses in Bogor, Depok, Bekasi and Tangerang, according to the survey.

Transportation observer Darma-ningtyas said that one of the reasons Bekasi contributed the most commuters to Jakarta was because it had more residents than other areas in Bogor, Depok and Tangerang.

Based on the BPS'€™ 2012 data, Bekasi was home to 2.4 million people, while the numbers of people who lived in Depok and South Tangerang were 1.8 million and 1.4 million respectively.

Darmaningtyas also cited the smaller number of train stations and scheduled train journeys in Bekasi city compared to the other areas as a factor in the low number of commuters using commuter trains.

'€œBekasi city does not have enough train stations for the Commuter Line to transport its residents. Therefore, they prefer to use their own vehicles or take other means of public transportation,'€ he told The Jakarta Post on Monday.

A commuter from Bekasi, Harza Sandityo, echoed the statement, saying that he preferred taking his car or a public bus to get to his office located on Jl. Sudirman in South Jakarta. '€œThe train station is located quite far from my office, but I have better access to bus stations,'€ Harza said.

In 2014, PT KAI Commuter Jabodetabek (KCJ), the commuter railway company, carried more than 700,000 commuters per day, which was less than 7 percent of Jakarta'€™s night time population.

KCJ has mapped out a train-procurement program from 2008 to 2019 to meet a target of transporting 1.2 million passengers in 2019 as set out by the Presidential Working Unit for the Supervision and Management of Development (UKP4).

The social statistics unit head at BPS Jakarta, Sri Santo Budi Muliatinah, said she hoped the commuter survey could help the city administration in making the right public-policy decisions related to the transportation sector.

'€œWe want to picture the characteristics of commuters in Jakarta and maybe the administration could consider it in its efforts to reduce the city'€™s congestion,'€ Sri said.

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