Transjakarta president director Budi Kaliwono said on Friday that the number of passengers increased by 10 percent from 340,000 people per day in June to 374,000 people per day in August, the period during which the Jakarta Police were trying out the odd-even policy. The number of passengers in July was unusually low, at 295,000 people per day, as during that month many Jakartans left the city to celebrate Idul Fitri.

“The two major reasons are the lane clearance efforts of many parties and the implementation of the odd-even license plate policy,” he said.

Budi said the Transportation Agency and the Jakarta Police have made great efforts to keep the Transjakarta lanes clear by installing movable concrete barriers (MCB) to separate them from the regular lanes.

“I thank both parties that have helped me,” he said.

Budi said clear lanes guaranteed fast travel time, which also lured other commuters like private vehicle owners and those who took other transportation modes to take Transjakarta buses.

“The buses become more reliable when the lanes are clear,” he said.

Reliable headway is still one of the biggest problems faced by Transjakarta. Different from commuter lines that have dedicated railways, Transjakarta becomes less reliable when private vehicles use the bus lanes.

As of May, the Transportation Agency installed MCB along 120 kilometers of Transjakarta’s total 420 km of lanes.

Budi said the implementation of the odd-even licence plate policy, which only became permanent on Tuesday, also increased the number of passengers.

“We deployed 200 more buses to anticipate the increasing number of passengers in particular lanes because of the odd-even policy,” he said.

The policy, which was on trial last month and took effect last Saturday, requires private cars to take turns using particular roads in the city based on their plate numbers during weekdays between the hours of 7 a.m. and 10 a.m. and from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. Cars with odd-numbered plates can use the designated streets on odd dates, while vehicles with even-numbered plates can use them on even dates.

Budi said his company aimed to get up to 15 million passengers per month this year as it had only 11.58 million in August. “We will buy more buses to reach the number,” he said.

“More passengers mean more income for us, so the buses do not run for nothing,” he said.

He said, therefore, he was not worried when the city administration decided to cut its subsidy for Transjakarta passengers.

The city administration is set to reduce the total passenger subsidy from Rp 1.6 trillion (US$122 million) to Rp 1.28 trillion in the revised city budget draft.

Jakarta Asset and Financial Management Body (BPKAD) head Heru Budi Hartono said the administration decided to decrease the amount of the subsidy as it believed the policy would not hurt the service of the company.

Heru said the other reason was that the BRT operator had not achieved its bus-purchasing target.

“Our initial calculation was that they would buy 500 more buses this year, but they only bought 200 so far,” he said.

He added that it meant that the company did not have to spend money on operating the additional 300 buses.

Heru said the loss of Rp 400 billion from the subsidy would not affect ticket prices or make the company downgrade other services.

Transjakarta’s ticket price, which is Rp 3,500, has not been increased since 2004 and the city administration has increased its subsidy every year to cover the operational costs.

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