JAKARTA -- The Indonesia government is planning to build a mass rapid transit (MRT) system costing 900 million dollars in an attempt to ease congestion in its traffic-choked capital of Jakarta, local media reports said Tuesday.
Construction of the ambitious elevated train project was expected to begin in 2010 and be completed by late 2014, said Fauzi Bowo, Jakarta's deputy governor.
The system would stretch 14.3 kilometres, from Lebak Bulus in South Jakarta to Dukuh Atas in Central Jakarta, Bowo said, adding that the project would be financed by soft loans from the Japan Bank for International Cooperation.
"The project will eventually integrate with other transportation facilities, such as Jakarta's busway, monorail and waterway (taxis)," Bowo, who won Jakarta's August 8 gubernatorial election, was quoted as saying by The Jakarta Post.
"Moreover, the project will automatically place Jakarta alongside modern cities such as Hong Kong, New Delhi, Bangkok, Seoul, Tokyo and Singapore," he added.
The MRT trains have an average cruising speed of 26 kilometres per hour and would carry as many as 400,000 passengers a day. Travellers would spend up to 32 minutes travelling one way on the line between Lebak Bulus to Dukuh Atas, which would have seven stations.
The MRT proposal is the latest in a series of projects planned by the Jakarta city administration to address traffic problems. For years, officials have planned to build a subway system, which today exists only on paper, and construction of a citywide monorail has barely begun and is already facing funding problems.
Low water levels in Jakarta's canals caused by drought and solid waste have forced the city administration to suspend its water taxi service, less then three months after it was inaugurated.
Jakarta has more than 12 million residents, and another 6 million live on the city's outskirts, leaving many areas vulnerable to traffic jams. Air pollution and garbage management are also severe problems.
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