| Our man | Technology fromAmsterdam
Profile
by Richard Butter
January/February 2020 Traffic Technology International
www.TrafficTechnologyToday.com
077
Being in Jakarta always
disorientates me. Very
gentle people, humid
weather and awfully congested. And
travelling towards the city centre, I always
pass by slums that remind me of how
fortunate I am. I once volunteered for a
charity which focused on poverty, so I have
a little awareness of the conditions faced by
those living in slums like those in Jakarta.
Despite the poverty, one of the first
impressions you’re likely to get of the city
is that smart mobility solutions are popular.
And that is also what is so confusing about
Jakarta. On the one hand, there is the very
visible poverty, but on the other you have
sophisticated smart mobility and they
exist together. The current era of
digitalization in fact makes smart
mobility accessible to everyone.
At this point it’s worth mentioning
ojek ride-sharing and why it’s so important.
Ojek literally means motorbike taxi and
there is a very informal approach to how
these vehicles are managed in Jakarta.
Neither the national nor local governments
consider the motorbikes in need of
regulation since they are considered to
be useful in solving the existing urban
mobility problems, as well as a source of
job creation. In crowded and jammed cities
like Jakarta, ojek provides citizens with fast
mobility. In spite of the unregulated nature,
this long standing travel method has
shaped an unwritten understanding
between those affected, i.e. government,
users and drivers, and also the ojek drivers
themselves. These drivers settle at a certain
place on a daily basis, mostly in residential,
office and shopping districts. One
customer from the Jakarta area expressed
to me the beauty of this informal
institution as he experiences it. Situated
in a residential area, he described how
the interaction between him and several
drivers is like a friendship and a
brotherhood. It is clear that transportation
like ojek makes life more beautiful!
Which brings me to start-up company
Gojek. With the same platform idea
as Uber, but with a different mode of
transport. Gojek opened-up the first ridesharing
business in Indonesia around four
years ago. Seeing ojek as a daily need for
many citizens, customers initially booked
via a phone call but have since introduced
a smartphone app. Gojek’s entry to the
market was quite impressive by promoting
two values, i.e. safety and standardized
rates, two highly desirable deliverables
for modern societies. As many big cities
in Indonesia are currently, in terms of
population, dominated by an abundant
young middle class, the ojek ride-sharing
service has got massive growth potential.
A young mother working in Jakarta
expressed to me her happiness with the
ride-sharing service, indicating that she
feels more safe while using it than when
travelling on public transport.
And at the end of the day that’s what
we want from mobility. We are all human,
we want to feel safe, stay healthy and have
some joie de vivre. It’s good that the
current technology is being made available
to all. Even those in poor parts of Jakarta.
Richard Butter is director of traffic technology at RAI
Amsterdam and is responsible for Intertraffic worldwide
events, intertraffic.com
The egalitarian nature
of smart mobility
in Jakarta
“Neither national
nor local government
consider motorbike taxis
in need of regulation”
21-24 APR 2020 AMSTERDAM
JENOPTIK Stand: 12.804
limit for the cameras. It detects
vehicles around 500 metres
south of the Bindermichl entry
portal until immediately after
the Niedernhart exit in the
direction of Freistadt. In the
west, the monitored area extends
to the ramp of the junction in the
direction of Linz city centre.
However, a total of 20 cameras
are also active at all entrances
and exits (such as the
Muldenstraße roundabout) in
this section of the A7. A total of
25 possible routes are monitored.
This approach works:
monitoring shows that in areas
controlled with Section Control,
the average speed is reduced by
10 kph for cars and 15 kph for
trucks. A reduction in accidents
of up to 50% was recorded on all
sections with permanently
installed systems.
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