Governor Ahok wants to make this legal (for a price)
How many times have you sat in the macet while enviously looking on as the Transjakarta bus gets to skip the traffic on their exclusive busway lane? Well, soon you can drive your car on the busway too (legally).
“I am pitching an idea, when all the [busway] lanes [separators] are heightened, [cars] can enter the busway,” Jakarta Governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama said at City Hall yesterday, as quoted by Liputan 6.
But it won’t come cheap. Ahok said drivers wanting to drive on the busway must own an e-money card. They would then be charged at least Rp 50,000 each time they decide to take the express busway lane.
“If you feel like you want to show off that you’re rich, you can drive on the busway as long as you pay Rp 200,000. If you’re even richer still we’ll raise it to Rp 500,000,” Ahok said half-jokingly.
Whatever the price, the idea is for drivers to tap their e-money cards on machines that would be installed at every Tranjakarta bus stop.
Ahok admitted that he came up with the idea when his friend complained to him about paying a large amount of tax for a luxury car but cannot drive on the busway.
“My friend said, listen Hok, you’re disgraceful. I pay Rp 28 million in taxes for this Lexux, why can’t I drive on your busway? I have money, how much do you want?” Ahok recounted his friend’s words.
Ahok then thought he could take advantage of rich people who want to skip the macet. The money raised from this policy would then go towards paying for the maintenance of the city’s free double decker buses.
