They help residents get around the city a bit faster than other means of public transportation. However, nowadays, they are also seen as being part of the city’s traffic problem. Many drivers encroach on roadsides and station entrances to wait for passengers, which often causes traffic jams.

A regular online ojek user, M. Saiful, 34, said the service helped him a lot, but he admitted that he was often bothered by the traffic jams caused by the drivers.

“It’s funny that I feel annoyed by the ojek drivers and their passengers on congested roads as I’m actually contributing to the problem,” the Grogol, West Jakarta, resident told The Jakarta Post.

In a bid to improve the traffic situation, the Jakarta Transportation Agency would be cooperating with the police to ticket drivers who parked their motorbikes on the side of the road, the agency’s operational control division head, Maruli Tua Sijabat, said.

The Transportation Ministry recently issued a regulation on online motorcycle taxis as a form of public transportation.

The regulation, signed by Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi on March 11, set standards on how drivers should pick up or drop off their customers. It also calls on ride-hailing companies to provide shelters for their drivers so they can wait for customers in an orderly fashion.

“However, we want to avoid punishing them. We are prioritizing figuring out how to achieve our goals to discipline them,” Maruli told the Post.

He said he had urged the companies to work with parking providers and residents to provide shelters for the drivers.

Many drivers, however, have said a lack of shelter or proper parking spaces have forced them to wait for customers on the side of the road.

One driver, Genesa Batuara, said companies should comply with the requirements to prevent drivers from being ticketed.

“If they provide shelters, we will definitely follow the rules,” the 32-year-old said at Karet station in South Jakarta on Friday.

The road in front of the station is full from morning until noon, as drivers wait for their passengers, making it difficult for cars to pass through. The motorcycle drivers also often drive in the wrong direction on the one-way street, which exacerbates the situation.

Traffic issues are also common near Palmerah station in West Jakarta and Tanah Abang station in Central Jakarta.

Genesa said the Jakarta administration had tried to erect a shelter near Tanah Abang station last year, but conventional taxi drivers rejected it, forcing their ride-hailing counterparts to wait for passengers elsewhere.

Another driver, Tri Sudarwanto, argued that passengers might not want to wait for drivers at a designated parking area.

“If there are shelters and we can only stay there to wait for orders, then what happens if the place is far from our pick-up locations? Customers are often reluctant to wait for a long time and might cancel their orders. It would affect our income,” Tri said, suggesting that the regulation required that every station should facilitate both drivers and passengers.

His concerns were echoed by Hasnawati, who works in Kuningan, South Jakarta. She said she often canceled her order if the driver was too far away.

“I would ask them first. I would wait if they were 10 minutes away, but I wouldn’t if they said it was too far away or there was a traffic jam,” she added.

Meanwhile, state-owned railway operator PT Kereta Api Indonesia (KAI) spokesman Edy Kuswoyo said the company had yet to talk about potential shelters or drop-off and pick-up locations with any ride-hailing companies.

“We’ve never met. We’ve also never invited them,” Edy said.

However, he noted, even though they had yet to build shelters, the companies already had their own drop-off and pick-up locations. Grab, he said, already had 49 meeting points, while homegrown firm Go-Jek only had seven. (ggq)

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