T

he police have vowed to carry out all measures necessary to ease traffic congestion in Jakarta and its surrounding highways in anticipation of a returning wave of travelers after the Christmas holiday exodus.

Earlier on Thursday, a sea of motor vehicles were reportedly trapped for hours on Jakarta'€™s inner and outer toll roads as well as on several highways connecting the capital with neighboring regions. The heavy congestion was the result of a large number of travelers leaving the Greater Jakarta area to spend the Christmas long weekend outside of the metropolis.

On the Jakarta-Cikampek toll road, for example, traffic police had to take several measures to handle the severe traffic congestion, including closing several toll gates and the rest areas along the 19 kilometer-long highway to ease bottlenecks.

However, none of these measures reduced the congestion in any significant way.

Many travelers, hoping to spend the holiday in popular getaway destinations such as Bandung and the resort area of Puncak in Bogor regency reportedly decided to turn their cars around and abandon their holiday plans after spending hours on the road without marking any significant change in distance.

The congestion continued into Friday, but with less intensity.

Speaking to The Jakarta Post on Friday, Jakarta Traffic Police chief Sr. Comr. Risyapudin Nursin acknowledged that he and his colleagues had not adequately prepared themselves to effectively meet and deal with the traffic chaos, arguing that the number of cars leaving the city prior to the eve of the long weekend had drastically exceeded his expectations.

'€œTo be honest, we did not expect that the number of cars leaving the city for the holiday would be that large,'€ Risyapudin said.

This month, Muslims and Christians in Indonesia observed major religious holidays consecutively, as Christmas fell on Friday, a day after the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad. Both religious celebrations were declared national holidays.

Risyapudin said that unlike the mass exodus during the Islamic holiday of Idul Fitri during which people used various means of transportation to leave the capital, most of the travelers during the Christmas holiday season had preferred to travel in private cars.

The police predict that the peak of the returning wave will be divided into two periods: Sunday and Monday for the people who will return to Jakarta for the New Year, and Jan. 3 and 4 for Jakartans who will spend New Year festivities away from the city.

'€œFor the returning wave, we will coordinate with the West Java and Central Java Police and [state-owned toll road operator] PT Jasa Marga to make sure that our traffic engineering policies will be effective and will ease the congestion,'€ he said, adding that the Jakarta Police would deploy up to 600 police officers to handle the traffic.

Separately, National Police Traffic Police chief Insp. Gen. Condro Kirono said on Friday that the severe traffic congestion had been exacerbated by the many heavy vehicles that were still operating during the holidays.

'€œThey have added to the congestion. We have already sent a letter to the Transportation Ministry asking them to limit their operating hours for the next three weeks,'€ he said.

According to data from PT Jasa Marga, more than 104,000 vehicles used the Jakarta-Cikampek toll road throughout Wednesday, a substantial increase from the 76,000 vehicles that travel on the road during regular days.

Elsyta, a resident of Jakarta, said she and her family had been forced to cancel their plan to visit her parents'€™ house in Bandung after spending five hours on the toll road.

'€œWe left home on Wednesday evening in a hope of better traffic. However, five hours later, we were still stuck in Karawang [West Java]. It was not even halfway to our destination,'€ she said on Friday, adding that on a regular day, she would only need an hour to get to Karawang.

Fauzan Sazli, another resident of Jakarta, said he had needed more than 12 hours to finally arrive in Bandung early on Friday.

'€œWe left Jakarta at 2 p.m. on Thursday and the congestion had already started when we entered the inner-city toll road in Pancoran [South Jakarta],'€ he said, adding that he usually spent around three hours to drive to Bandung from Jakarta.

Meanwhile, five Jakartans, including a 3-month-old baby, were killed on Friday morning after their Suzuki APV minivan hit a truck that was parked on the side of the road on Java'€™s northern coastal area (Pantura) highway in Subang, West Java.

The National Police have recorded 73 traffic accidents since the start of the exodus on Thursday, resulting in the loss of 20 lives.
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