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Transjakarta caused traffic jams in initial years of operation, study says
While Transjakarta is lauded by many as the breakthrough solution for Jakarta’s infamous traffic congestion, a study has suggested otherwise, arguing that the capital’s first bus rapid transit (BRT) system had the spillover effect of worsening jams in the initial years of its operation
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span>While Transjakarta is lauded by many as the breakthrough solution for Jakarta’s infamous traffic congestion, a study has suggested otherwise, arguing that the capital’s first bus rapid transit (BRT) system had the spillover effect of worsening jams in the initial years of its operation.
The study by University of Kansas associate professor Arya Gaduh, an economist from the nonprofit global policy think tank RAND Corporation, Tadeja Gračner, and Alexander D. Rothenberg of Syracuse University observed the impact of Transjakarta on traffic and motorists’ behavior, based on Greater Jakarta transportation data provided by the Japan International Corporation Agency (JICA) from 2002 to 2010.
According to JICA data, in 2002 public buses carried 52.3 percent of commuters, followed by private motorcycles at 22.1 percent and private cars at 13.8 percent.
The Jakarta administration launched Transjakarta with its first corridor on Jan. 15, 2004, connecting Blok M in South Jakarta to Kota in West Jakarta, passing the capital’s main business districts along Jl. MH Thamrin and Jl. Sudirman. The service took inspiration from the BRT Transmilenio in Bogotoa, Colombia.
“It’s true that our study found Transjkakarta worsened traffic on its corridors [from 2002 to 2010]. One of the reasons was because its initial implementation was not that good yet,” Arya told The Jakarta Post via email on Tuesday.
The operation of Transjakarta sparked public criticism at that time as the service took space from the existing thoroughfare for a dedicated lane.
However, as years went by, the city-owned firm gradually attracted more passengers. In 2010, according to JICA, Transjakarta gained a 4.3 percent share of commuters. However, at the top was private motorcycles with 50.8 percent, public buses with 23.4 percent, and private cars with 11.7 percent.
Besides being only able to capture less than 5 percent of commuters in its initial years of operation, the study found that between 2002 and 2010 travel times on Transjakarta lanes increased by 12.9 percent.
As of 2010, Transjakarta had up to nine corridors and now it has expanded into 13 main corridors with extra subcorridors to cater to the mobility needs of residents. Of all 13 corridors, only corridor 13 runs on special elevated lanes above the existing road while other corridors still share space with other vehicles.
Arya acknowledged that his research has yet to analyze travel time after 2010, arguing that a massive amount of data was not available as the last research on Greater Jakarta transportation was by JICA in 2010.
According to data from the Greater Jakarta Commuter Survey by BPS in 2014, Transjakarta only had a 2.5 percent share of transportation.
However, Arya stressed that that the main message of his study was not that Transjakarta worsened traffic congestion, but to show that it has the potential to decrease travel time and quality of service if it adopted several policies such as improving the buses’ speed and comfort.
“Public transit cannot be separated from other transportation policies and the effectively of public transit must be supported with other policies such as electronic road pricing,” Arya said.
The Jakarta administration is still putting on hold its plan to implement the long-awaited electronic road pricing (ERP) because of legal issues surrounding the procurement process. The city has reopened tenders for ERP and planned to start it in 2021.
In the meantime, the odd-even traffic policy had been expanded to arterial roads in September this year as part of efforts to alleviate traffic congestion.
Transjakarta argued that it has improved much after the initial years of its operation, especially after 2010, with expanded corridors and routes.
Transjakarta engineering and facility director Yoga Adi Winarto said the main mandate of the company was to provide access for public transportation as the government enacted policies to reduce congestion by pushing people to shift from their private vehicles.
“In its essence, Transjakarta is public transport to increase citizens’ mobility,” Yoga told the Post.
He said that even public transport that didn’t take up existing road lanes, such as the MRT, would not guarantee to reduce congestion if it was not combined with other policies and other modes of transportation.
Yoga said that Transjakarta had also expanded its access, especially to areas outside the corridors, by providing feeder routes since 2016, resulting in 80 percent of areas in proper Jakarta with access to a Transjakarta bus stop within 500 meters.
Yoga also said that much has changed in Transjakarta since 2010, including in terms of passenger numbers, when in 2010 it carried about 320,000 passengers daily but the number had tripled to 980,000 passengers this year.
Separately, ITDP Indonesia director Faela Sufa said it was unfair to say Transjakarta caused traffic congestion.
“Why unfair? Because most of Jakarta’s roads are occupied by private vehicles,” Faela said.
She said that in the case of Jl. Sudirman, the wall to wall road width was 68.25 meters, while the bus lane only takes up 11.7 percent.
Faela also pointed out that the capacity of a bus was more than that of regular private cars, as a bus can carry 80 to 150 passengers while a car’s occupancy rate was about 2.2 passengers.
