Cycling as First Mile in Jakarta through Secondary & Tertiary Roads

This writing is triggered by an article that was written by a colleague of mine, Daniel Caesar Pratama: Considering Cycling as A Mode of Commuting in Jakarta: A GIS Analysis Exercise.

He used GIS to do spatial analyses to show that when we integrate cycling infrastructure with mass transit system in Jakarta, the coverage area of the mass transit will be increased to 80%. The summary points from his article were:

• Cycling has a huge potential to be a sustainable, resilient, affordable and robust mode of transportation.
• Cycling is best positioned as the first-mile last-mile solution rather than as the main transportation system.
• Cycling as transportation should be done leisurely and comfortable, therefore 4 km (5–15 minutes of cycling) from transit to destination is preferable.
• By optimizing cycling infrastructures to cater the cycling radius below 4km, cycling should not compete with online taxi bikes nor walking.
• Integrating cycling with the mass transit such as MRT, KRL, and TransJakarta increases their service area to cover 80% of Jakarta.
• Cycling infrastructures should be prioritized to be integrated into stations that serve the most populated and are able to reach the most destinations.
• By utilizing GIS spatial analysis, we can create a powerful tool to have better-informed decisions about the shaping of our city.

Following that article, Daniel, together with Adam Nurilman – his old friend, and Urban+ Institute held a series of workshops to explore the idea, in partnership with XDS Lab and Somia CX. I had the opportunity to join one of the workshop sessions as team member of the first team. In this writing I'll try to elaborate and structure a bit more the idea that I submitted to the workshop.

The Problem

I am not a commuter cyclist, so when the workshop put forth a question of how to make cycling be more possible for first and last mile transportation mode in Jakarta, integrated with transit system (such as BRT, LRT, MRT, and/or Commuter Line), the first thing that I did was to imagine how would it felt like to cycle (especially) the first mile of commuting in Jakarta – from home to the nearest or strategic transit point. Let’s examine the underlying situation.

In general, Jakarta is a very cluster-fragmented city. Though most of the neighborhoods are not exactly clusters by definition, but most of the neighborhoods are arranged like an almost closed circuit with minimal accessibility, with labyrinth-like road network, and some (many) times are located inside or in-between yet another clustered neighborhoods. Though it might not be relevant to this discussion, the reason for that condition might be single use (residential) zoning system that are still being implemented up until today.

The Language of Jakartan Car Passing

In Jakarta, car drivers love to change lanes incessantly and tries to overtake other vehicles on the road. They do it to the point of breaking the law and sacrificing the safety of theirselves and others.

Even sicker, some of them do it with very lack of manner. They'll pass the other car in a very thin distance, or immediately put themselves sharply in front of the passed car, or doing it while honking dramatically.

International Guide For Driving Or Riding In Jakarta

One cannot be considered has truly experienced Jakarta if he or she has not tried to drive a car there, on its highways, in its traffic, in rush hour, behind the steering wheel. But that is only second to the ultimate challenge, the surreal life and death experience, the act of courage and totality, one way to become one with the city itself, feeling and living its heartbeat; riding a motor bike. If any of you really want to be elevated to that level of understanding of Jakarta, this International Guide is created to facilitate that purpose.


Disclaimer: Although this International Guide is very rich in detailed facts, one must understand that most of them, if not all, are potentially against the law, and that this International Guide is basically a style of writing that uses humor, irony, exaggeration, and ridicule to expose and criticize something. Both the writer and the writing of this International Guide cannot be held responsible in case anything happened, either good or bad, that resulted from reading or practicing the content of this International Guide.

Road Density And Its Efficiency

In a heavily congested road like those of Jakarta's in the afternoon, even a supercar can no longer be super. It is because one of the inherent problem of private-vehicles-based transportation system, that the efficiency will fall as the density grows.

[Here in Indonesia, we drive on the left lane of the road, which means the slowest vehicle will normally be on the left and the faster will be on the right.]

Let's imagine a three-lane toll road occupied by smoothly moving vehicles. The slowest vehicles, the trucks, the busses, and the trailers are there on the first lane. There will be some of those slowest vehicles that actually able to drive a little bit faster than the vehicle in front of them, and they take the chance, they will move to the second lane and pass over the vehicle on the first lane. The denser the road, it will be illogical for them to return to the first lane, for there will be another slower vehicles there. It will stay on the second lane instead.

The World As I See It

Some would be about cities and urban life,
some other capture humanity,
and the rest would merely show my indecent appetite towards

space, pattern, & geometry.

Praise To The Driverless Cars

The world lately is in a hype of the development of a new technological breakthrough in transportation field, prominent companies like Apple, Google, Tesla, Mercedes-Benz, etc are in the race to deliver the best and functional: Driverless Cars.

The development of Driverless Cars employs so many frontier technology; robotics, radar, lidar, GPS, odometry, computer vision, advanced control system, space sensing, etc. New ideas of how a car should be able to behave are also tried to be implemented, for example design of wheels that can rotate 90 degrees so a car can maneuvers to its side directly to escape a congestion.

Despite being progressive in terms of technological advancement and product design, the true nature of the invention and development of Driverless Cars tend to be conservative.

Jakarta, Kemacetan, Jalan Tol, & Transportasi Publik Berbasis Rel

Marxistically; di Jakarta, untuk pergi ke tempat penghisapannya saja

buruh harus pikir sendiri transportasinya.

Pada waktu kampanye pemilihan Gubernur dan Wakil Gubernur DKI Jakarta, Jokowi dan Ahok menyatakan tidak akan meneruskan proyek pembangunan Enam ruas Tol Dalam Kota.

Tetapi sikap tersebut tiba-tiba berubah pada bulan Agustus-September tahun 2014, Gubernur DKI Jakarta Basuki Tjahaya Purnama (waktu itu masih Plt. Gubernur) mengatakan akan meneruskan proyek pembangunan enam ruas jalan tol dalam kota Jakarta. Salah satu tujuannya, sesuai dengan perkataan Ahok, adalah untuk meningkatkan rasio jalan dan mengurangi kemacetan di Jakarta.

Jalur Besi & Air Laut: Masa Depan Indonesia

150 tahun sejak 1864 ketika jalur Kereta Api pertama di Nusantara mulai dibangun, menghubungkan Kemijen dan Tanggung di Jawa Tengah, pada tahun 2014 ini Indonesia melakukan ground breaking proyek jalur Kereta Api Trans Sulawesi pada tanggal 12 Agustus kemarin. Trase pertama seluruhnya berada di provinsi Sulawesi Selatan, menghubungkan kota Makassar dengan Parepare sepanjang 145 kilometer. Proyek ini direncanakan untuk terus dikembangkan hingga mencapai panjang sekitar 2000 kilometer yang menghubungkan seluruh provinsi dan berbagai kota di pulau Sulawesi.

Dari membaca berbagai berita, kabarnya pemerintah memang berniat untuk membangun, melengkapi, dan memperpanjang jalur-jalur kereta api di berbagai tempat di Indonesia. Mulai dari Jawa, Sumatera, Sulawesi, bahkan Kalimantan. Dan memang proyek ini harus diteruskan dan ditingkatkan oleh pemerintahan Jokowi, untuk dikawinkan dengan konsep Tol Lautnya.

Juara Penguasaan Spasial Jakarta

Seorang penari balet yang handal, pembalap ulung, pemain sepak bola yang lihai, atau atlet bela diri yang sangat tangkas memiliki kecerdasan penguasaan spasial (keruangan) pada medannya masing-masing. Demikian juga dengan para pelaku berbagai macam profesi dan keterampilan lainnya yang memanfaatkan gerak tubuh atau pengendalian suatu alat di dalam suatu ruang berbatas.

Tetapi kali ini mari kita mengapresiasi perihal penguasaan ruang dari perspektif yang lain. Kali ini kita akan meniliknya dari sudut pandang Kota Jakarta.

Studi Kasus Kemacetan Jakarta: Grogol - Tomang

Kemacetan adalah salah satu permasalahan Utama di kota Jakarta yang sampai hari ini masih belum terselesaikan juga dan sepertinya malah semakin bertambah parah dari hari ke hari.

Kemacetan dengan skala sebesar kemacetan di kota Jakarta ini pun tentu saja tidak akan bisa diselesaikan dengan cara yang parsial, setengah-setengah, dan tambal sulam. Akan dibutuhkan suatu metode penyelesaian yang bersifat menyeluruh dan mengatasi permasalahan hingga ke akar-akarnya.

Penulis sangat setuju bahwa akar permasalahannya terletak pada tidak tersedianya moda transportasi publik yang memadai - baik dari sudut pandang kualitas maupun kuantitas, terlalu banyaknya kendaraan pribadi yang membanjiri jalan-jalan, dan perencanaan kota yang terlampau berorientasi pada kendaraan pribadi. Ketiga hal tersebut saling mempengaruhi secara dialektis; tidak adanya transportasi publik yang memadai mendorong orang untuk menggunakan kendaraan pribadi, semakin banyak yang menggunakannya maka semakin berorientasi pada pengguna kendaraan pribadi pengembangan kotanya, semakin berorientasi pada penggunaan kendaraan pribadi maka akan semakin lesu perkembangan moda transportasi publik, dan seterusnya.