JAKARTA, KOMPAS – The government has urged people not to use motorcycles to return to their hometowns for this year’s Idul Fitri holiday at the end of the Ramadhan fasting month. However, the government has yet to offer any solution to reduce the ever-increasing number of motorcyclists during the annual exodus.
“We have urged people not to ride motorcycles in the exodus. Pick other transportation options before resorting to using motorcycles,” Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi said in a Gadjah Mada University Alumni Family (Kagama) event. The discussion, held under the theme “Strategies to Resolve Exodus Traffic Congestion and Efforts to Reduce Traffic Casualties”, was supported by state-owned ferry operator PT ASDP and Kompas and was held at the Youth and Sports Ministry building in Jakarta on Sunday (18/6/2017).
Budi made the statement as, according to data from the National Police’s traffic corps, about 70 percent of the 2,900 traffic accidents during the 2016 Idul Fitri exodus involved motorbikes.
In 2016, 5.13 million motorcycles were used in the exodus. In 2017, the figure is expected to rise to 6.06 million. The concern is that this rise will increase the risk of traffic accidents.
“It is not recommended to use motorbikes for the exodus as they are not designed for long-distance travel. At certain points during their journey, bikers will be fatigued and this will lead to accidents,” Gadjah Mada University transportation observer Sigit Priyanto said.
A Kompas reporter, who journeyed on a motorcycle from Jakarta to Cirebon in West Java, found that bikers are often fatigued and needed to rest every two hours. The heat, the dust, the wind and the need to be focused all the time induced this fatigue.
Java’s northern coastal road, which is not smooth and is riddled with holes, makes the journey even riskier for motorcyclists.
Suryanto, a motorcyclist on exodus from Serpong in South Tangerang, Banten, said that he realized there was a high risk of traffic incidents for people like him. He cited fatigue, the poor condition of roads and the presence of other motorists as the reasons for this high risk. However, he still preferred to use a motorbike to get home to Kendal in Central Java.
“The cost for the journey is lower when I use a motorbike compared to using the bus or the train. When I ride a motorbike, it is easier for me to avoid traffic jams. Also, without my motorbike, I will not be able to travel around my hometown with my wife,” Suryanto said.
Soegijapranata Catholic University transportation observer Djoko Setijowarno said that the number of people using motorbikes on the exodus is always increasing as there are several problems that the central and local governments have never resolved. The first problem is the inadequate number of options for cheap mass transportation from Jakarta to a number of regions on Java and Sumatra.
The second problem is the difficulty and expense of finding public transportation between bus, plane and train terminals or stations and the villages that the travelers need to go to. Even when such transportation is available, the vehicles have usually been illegally repurposed and passengers are charged exorbitant prices.
The next problem is the absence of village transportation that facilitates travelers to go around their hometowns.
On the other hand, free exodus travel programs are only able to accommodate 48,000 motorcyclists, less than 1 percent of the number of people who use bikes.
“If the central and local governments do not resolve these problems immediately, the problem of the increasing number of exodus travelers using motorbikes will never be resolved,” Djoko said.
Budi Karya said that he acknowledged that such problems must be resolved by the central and local government.
National Police’s Traffic Corps head Insp. Gen. Royke Lumowa said that the police could not ban people from using their motorbikes for the exodus as there were no clear regulations on the matter. The police could only ban overloading motorcycles with more than two riders.
“On the road, police officers will ask exodus travelers to slow down and suggest they spend more time in the rest areas to reduce the risk of traffic incidents,” Royke said.
Toll roads
Toll Road Regulatory Agency (BPJT) head Herry Trisaputra Zuna said that a decision will be made on Monday about whether the 21-kilometer Bekasi-Cawang-Kampung Melayu (Becakayu) toll road will be opened for traffic during the Idul Fitri period.
“There will be a meeting on Monday to review the preparedness and to decide whether to use the toll road,” Herry said.
In Palembang, South Sumatra, a 30-meter stretch of a functioning toll road between Palembang and Indralaya on Kilometer 1+350 sank into the ground on Saturday.
PT Hutama Karya president director I Gusti Ngurah Putra said that the sunken road was not part of the main Palembang-Indralaya toll road, but an access road heading toward the toll road at the Pemulutan intersection.
“Currently, its condition is stable, but there is a possibility that tomorrow the land may sink again. We will remain on guard. The important thing is that the people can use the road for the Idul Fitri exodus,” Putra said.
He added that the road sank into peat land. A vacuum consolidation method was used to build a foundation for most of the toll road on peat land, but the method could not applied at the sunken spot because of the presence of an extra-high-voltage power line that made it difficult to use a crane to install vertical drainage equipment.
(ECA/DRI/BKY/NAD/D15)
