Dig it up!: A worker hoes the ground, attempting to widen Krukut River in South Jakarta on Friday. The city administration has begun to widen the city'€™s rivers in anticipation of the floods that inevitably hit Jakarta during the rain season at the end of each year. (JP/Seto Wardhana)

After a long dry season, the government is gearing up for the start of the rainy season in mid-December by repairing a number of facilities to minimize the effects of flooding in the capital.

The Public Works and Public Housing Ministry said a number of workers at the Katulampa sluice gate in Bogor, West Java, had started collecting trash to prevent it from drifting down the Cisadane River and worsening flooding in Jakarta.

Puji Sutarto, head of the water resources network implementation unit at the ministry'€™s Ciliwung Cisadane Management Center, said recently that workers collected trash at the sluice gate whenever the water level was relatively low.

'€œKatulampa sluice gate is an important facility, therefore we need to carry out routine maintenance,'€ Puji told reporters.

The efforts, however, seemed to be just a drop in the bucket as flooding hit parts of the city on Sunday despite relatively dry weather in the capital.

The flooding, which was the result of heavy rain in Bogor, carried large amounts of trash from the upstream area, creating buildup in sections of the already heavily polluted Ciliwung River.

The inundation affected Cililitan, Kampung Melayu, Bidara Cina, Cawang, Buaran Tengah, Kampung Gedong '€” all in East Jakarta '€” as well as Pasar Minggu, Rawa Jati and Kebon Baru in South Jakarta.

Constructed while the country was under Dutch rule in 1911, the 104-meter sluice gate is used to monitor the level of water that streams from Bogor to Jakarta. It generally takes up to 12 hours for water from Katulampa to reach Manggarai sluice gate in South Jakarta.

Puji said the ministry had also placed breakwaters, protective structures made of stone or concrete, at the bottom of the river near Katulampa sluice gate to reduce the intensity of water flowing downstream.

According to him, the ministry had placed as many as 1,500 breakwaters in the river in 2013, however, most of them had been damaged as a result of intense water flow. '€œTherefore, we will place another 3,000 soon,'€ he continued.

Puji went on to say that when the water level at the sluice gate reached 200 centimeters, the water volume could reach 477,000 liters per second, urgently requiring breakwaters.

Besides maintaining Katulampa sluice gate, the ministry also revitalized a number of small lakes, locally known as situ, to increase water-catchment capacity.

Alexander Nandar, an official at the Ciliwung Cisadane Management Center, said the government would revitalize situ as at least 15 out of 180 situs along the Ciliwung and Cisadane rivers had been deemed in critical condition and in dire need of revitalization.

The government recently completed the revitalization of Situ Kebantenan in Bogor by increasing its water catchment area from 139,000 square meters to 180,000 sq m, said Alexander.

'€œWe hope that at least a 40,000 square-meter expansion can help reduce flooding in the city,'€ Alexander said.

Alexander added that besides Situ Kebantenan, the government would revitalize four other situs with a total budget of Rp 40 billion (US$3 million) from the 2015 state budget.

'€œThey are Situ Cikaret, Situ Gedong, Situ Cimanggis and Situ Cilala. Each of them need at least Rp 10 billion,'€ he said.

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