Since January, police have held the Millennial Road Safety Festival throughout the country’s 34 provinces, featuring competitions, art performances, marathons and speeches from popular figures.

“We are promoting a moral movement for [millennials] so they will be more cautious about road safety standards. We hope they can become agents for spreading this information,” the National Police Traffic Corps (Korlantas) traffic safety director Brig. Gen. Chrysnanda Dwi Laksana said recently.

The event begins with basic education about road safety followed by a training session, turning participants into what Chrysnanda called “master trainers”. After that, the participants are expected to use their knowledge in daily life and motivate others to do the same.

The idea, he said, was inspired by a 2018 Korlantas report that revealed that nearly 57 percent of the average 30,0000 road accident deaths per year since 2014 had been young adults between the ages of 15 and 38.

In Jakarta alone, the age group made up roughly 3,000 of the approximately 6,500 road accident victims in 2018.

“As the number suggests, millennials are prone to accidents because of their habit of using gadgets [while driving]. They ignore road safety standards, which could cause them to break the law or cause traffic accidents,” Chrysnanda said.

However, transportation expert Djoko Setijowarno begged to differ. While he applauded the police’s efforts to raise awareness on the matter, he criticized the event organizers for offering motorcycles as door prizes, which he deemed to be the root of the issue rather than gadget use.

The problem with motorcycles, he said, was that they offered minimal protection while being the cheapest option for young adults who wanted to own their own vehicles.

As such, he said he would much rather see authorities push for better public transportation to replace accident-prone motorcycles, especially ahead of the mudik (exodus) season during the Idul Fitri holiday during which thousands of people commute between cities.

As an example, he cited the government’s plan to establish a bus rapid transit (BRT) system, particularly in rural areas where bus networks have “been running haphazardly”.

Indonesian has witnessed a decline in its public transportation systems, including the near closing of the Sarbagita bus system in Bali, which has dwindled down to just one route since October last year after 16 routes were initially planned for the project.

On the other hand, every year, at least 1 million new cars and about 6 million new motorcycles hit the roads in Indonesia with the drivers having the freedom to break traffic regulations.

Motorcyclists driving without helmets or against the flow of traffic are an omnipresent sight in cities. Some of them are too young to drive. Motorists exceeding the speed limit on toll roads are able to do so without being pulled over by the police.

To encourage public transportation use and development, Djoko suggested that lawmakers tighten the 2009 Road Traffic and Transportation Law by imposing sanctions on regional heads who failed to provide public transportation. He also said the government should allocate funds for mass transportation infrastructure development.

In addition, young adults could also push the agenda to their local city administrations in order to speed up the process, he said.

“We have to tackle road accidents or else people will continue to die unnecessarily,” Djoko said on Monday.

Djoko’s call for improved public transportation comes amid a steady increase in road accidents. Korlantas recorded nearly 108,000 accidents in 2018, an increase from roughly 104,000 cases in 2017 and 106,591 cases
in 2016.

Globally, a 2018 World Health Organization study estimated that a person dies in a road accident every 24 seconds, adding up to roughly 1.35 million deaths each year. (mai)

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