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Jakarta to fortify coastal areas to reduce flood risks

As residents in Jakarta’s coastal areas have long dealt with regular flooding from both heavy rainfall and rising tidal waves, the city administration plans to implement a zero-runoff concept to minimize flood impacts

Sausan Atika (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, January 28, 2020

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Jakarta to fortify coastal areas to reduce flood risks

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span>As residents in Jakarta’s coastal areas have long dealt with regular flooding from both heavy rainfall and rising tidal waves, the city administration plans to implement a zero-runoff concept to minimize flood impacts.

The areas bordering on the Jakarta Bay in North Jakarta were under constant threat from the rising sea level and land subsidence. The zero-runoff concept would optimize [the flow of] water from the runoff in designated artificial lakes, North Jakarta Mayor Sigit Wijatmoko said.

As the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) had predicted high tides in the coastal areas for the past week, Sigit admitted the administration had let floods remain for a few hours at some places after heavy downpour on Friday.

“During high tide, it is impossible to pump water from land toward the sea because the water would forcibly get back to the land,” Sigit said on Friday.

“We actually need more catchment areas upstream, so that surface runoff would not need to be hastily pumped to of the sea,” he added.

When high tidal waves coincided with heavy rain, the municipality intentionally let the floodwater remain for some time in several areas of Marunda, Rorotan and East Semper, all located in Cilincing district. However, Sigit claimed, the flooded areas were only in urban forests and the unused grounds of a public cemetery.

He said the municipality had proposed several spots for the expansion of water catchment areas, such as in West Semper in Cilincing as well as in West Sunter and within the Intermediate Treatment Facility (ITF) Sunter compound managed by city-owned developer PT Jakarta Propertindo, both in the district of Tanjung Priok.

In addition, Sigit claimed, the municipality was currently in talks with private companies operating in northern Jakarta to contribute to flood mitigation efforts.

“We want to ask big industries to invest in pumps to handle flooding in their vicinity and not hurriedly release water into the drainage system. We are in talks about how [the companies] could store runoff in their areas first, so that the water volume in the drainage system could be controlled," said Sigit, who has been appointed by Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan as the project coordinator to manage Jakarta’s coastal areas.

Inhabited by around 1.7 million residents, North Jakarta suffers the worst and most rapid land subsidence in the capital, according to a study conducted by a team of researchers from the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB). Research shows that Jakarta has suffered from significant land subsidence since 1975.

The administration has agreed to continue the construction of the coastal wall under the first phase of the National Capital Integrated Coastal Development (NCICD) program to “defend” the coastal area against tidal flooding.

The NCICD’s first phase involves strengthening the existing coastal wall and building a new coastal wall of 120 kilometers along the coast of Jakarta, neighboring Bekasi in West Java and Tangerang in Banten.

Since 2014, however, progress has been sluggish, with the central government and the Jakarta administration having only built some 17 km of the proposed 120 km.

The slow progress in the first phase was blamed on funding issues and the division of responsibilities among the central government — represented by the Public Works and Housing Ministry —, the Jakarta administration and private companies.

The Governor's Team for Accelerated Development (TGUPP)’s coastal management committee recently unveiled findings and recommendations to address issues faced by Jakarta’s coastal areas.

Marco Kusumawijaya, who headed the committee for the study, said the management of the coastal embankment was one of seven main recommendations.

The other six recommendations are interconnectivity, public beaches, waste management and sanitation, coastal ecosystem improvement, decent housing as well as port and bay arrangement.

Coastal embankment management would involve continuing as well as reviewing the design and function of infrastructure "in accordance with coastal defense and urban water management purposes”, Marco said during a seminar on Friday.

To that end, a polder should be made available behind the coastal embankment, he said.

The ministry and the administration are currently in talks on moving on with the first phase of the NCICD project. Still, no final decision had been reached, Jakarta Water Resources Agency head Juaini Yusuf said.

The TGUPP’s recommendations to address issues in the coastal areas are divided into short, medium and long-term projects. Marco explained that the short-term projects included kampung revitalization. While the medium-term projects included the development of MRT Jakarta lines and an expansion of the Kamal Muara mangrove and the development of the historic Sunda Kelapa port as long-term goals in the project.

“Honestly, we [the TGUPP] have not set a timeline, but work on many of the recommendations has started,” he said, citing as an example the revitalization of Kampung Akuarium that is currently in progress.

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