T

he government continues to struggle to decide on a design and cost for the revitalization for the railway connecting Jakarta and Surabaya, East Java, due to a mismatch between budget expectations and estimations in studies.

The mismatch will delay the project past the initial target to determine a design by November.

Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi said the proposed project cost was based on studies by two agencies — one done by the Agency for the Assessment and Application of Technology (BPPT) and the other by the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) — were still deemed too costly.

The government previously stated that it expected the project’s cost to reach around Rp 60 trillion (US$4.4 billion). However, a study done by the BPPT showed that costs might hit the Rp 80 trillion mark.

JICA has also proposed the revitalization cost to reach RP 99 trillion.

“If there is a price of Rp 100 trillion, should I just agree to it? Of course not — I want the cost to be as low as possible with the right kind of technology,” Budi said on Wednesday.

He added that the high costs proposed by both parties was due to a proposal to construct a new track beside the existing one, as well as a slab track structure, where the railway track would be mounted on rigid concrete.

Such a structure is typically used for modern high-speed rail and light rail systems.

The government will have another discussion on the issue in Yogyakarta on Thursday, and will invite experts from South Korea and Germany to weigh in on the project’s design and cost.

Even so, Budi said the government would not insist on using the existing track, especially if it would disrupt the existing railway operations.

The deadline to determine the project’s design has been pushed back to January at the latest. Consequently, the start of construction might also be delayed. The train was previously estimated to start operating in 2020.

“We can also take care of the level-grade crossings in the meantime,” Budi said.

The government previously stated that the revitalization of the existing track would have a lot of consequences, including the eradication of almost 1,000 level-grade railway crossings. Moreover, it would not be able to reach maximum speed due to more than 100 turns in the existing tracks.

Three possible designs have been put on the table for the revitalization of the Jakarta-Surabaya railway: a fully conventional track with hundreds of level crossings, a partially elevated track to avoid level crossings or a high-speed, fully elevated track. The high-speed design was included as an option due to the long distance between the two cities at more than 700 kilometers.

The trains will run at around 150 km per hour, cutting the duration of the trip between Jakarta and Surabaya to five and a half hours from the current 12 hours.

The BPPT has predicted that 12.43 percent of airline passengers between the two cities, standing at around 8.04 million last year, will shift to the trains.

BPPT transportation technology system and facilities center director Rizqon Fajar said there remains a lot of factors that still need to be agreed on, including the cost to sterilize the level-grade railway crossings, track technology, as well as structure and land procurement.

Meanwhile, the Japanese Embassy’s deputy chief of mission, Kozo Honsei, confirmed that JICA and the BPPT were still discussing the issue.

“We have explained our calculations but we were ordered to scrutinize our proposal. We will try our best,” he said.