Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Two years after the debut of Jakarta's busway, passengers are getting increasingly concerned about its quality of service, a survey by the Indonesian Consumers Foundation (YLKI) revealed on Thursday.
The poll of 1,055 frequent passengers also showed strong resistance to any fare hike or zoned tariff system until the operator pledges to upgrade service.
"Our respondents are motorists who have left their private vehicles in their garages and shifted to the busway service because they expect better public transportation," YLKI's executive Tulus Abadi said.
"The rejection of the planned increased tarriff is not merely about money, but is more about the poor service they experience in using this system."
The survey found the problems that frequently annoy commuters include the disorganized departure and arrival of buses, poor cleanliness, bad drivers and the lack of feeder services.
Tulus predicted an increase in fares would discourage motorists to take busway.
"If the administration goes ahead with tariff hike, they might return to take its own vehicles to work," he said.
The survey was conducted on Dec 30 to Jan. 5 with 60 percent of respondents are commuters of the busway corridor I plying Blok M, South Jakarta to Kota, West Jakarta route.
The administration has earlier said that they would announced the new fare for busway during the launch ceremony of the new four corridors on Jan. 27.
The four new corridors will link Pulogadung in East Jakarta with Dukuh Atas in Central Jakarta; Kampung Melayu in East Jakarta with Ancol in North Jakarta; Ragunan in South Jakarta with Kuningan in South Jakarta; and Kampung Rambutan in East Jakarta with Kampung Melayu in East Jakarta.
The busway operator of the four corridors, TransJakarta, said of out the planned 203 bus fleet, it could only operate 20 because of late assemblage.
Also attending the Thursday press briefing were Indah Suksmaningsih, YLKI's senior executive and Andi Rahmah from non-government organization Pelangi Indonesia who were both members of the Jakarta Transportation Council tasked to formulate the busway new tariff.
Both Indah and Andi said they had long rejected the planned increase of busway tariff.
"The operators must first improve the level of services. I agree to discuss tariff hike after operators meet its promise to deploy more busses and improve the services," Indah said.
While Andi said that the administration must opened tender in selecting consortium in order to get competitive price to operate the busway corridors.
"There must also be audit on the performance of existing operators to know what are inefficiencies in the busway," she said.
The administration said that to make the busway affordable to all the fare needed to stay under Rp 5,000 (53 US cents). It is currently Rp 3,500.
It said the raise is inevitable in a bid to reduce the cost of subsidizing the transportation service. The cost of subsidizing all seven corridors is estimated at Rp 382 billion.
By raising the busway fare to Rp 5,000, the administration might slash the subsidy by 73 percent and reducing the cost of the subsidy to Rp 100 billion.
Jakarta currently operates three corridors with the number passengers of 120,000 per day.
The administration said with the planned 15 corridors, 30 percent of owners of private cars would be shifted to the busway.
To grab more commuters, the administration planned to ban motorbikes from the city main streets Jl. Sudirman, Jl. Thamrin and Jl. Rasuna Said. The survey said that many respondents used the busway service to avoid the daily severe traffic congestions in Jakarta
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