With angkot minivans, what you pay for is what you get. For a flat fare of around Rp 3,000 depending on the line, you get to ride in a rundown hunk of junk with nothing for ventilation but rolled down windows, meaning you get to sweat profusely and inhale the outside air pollution as an added bonus.
Bless the Transportation Ministry, then, for wanting to attempt the seemingly impossible task of improving the facilities of thousands of angkot minivans around Indonesia. Specifically, they want all angkots to have and provide air conditioning (AC) for passengers by 2018, as required by Transportation Ministry Regulation 29/2015.
“In that regulation, it’s stated that by 2018, all public transportation vehicles must provide AC at a temperature of 20-25 degrees Celsius,” said Transportation Ministry Land Vehicles director general Pudji Hartanto, as quoted by BeritaSatu.
Pudji added that a pilot project has already been launched in Bekasi, where all angkots on the 02 Pondok Gede-Bekasi line have been installed with ACs.
Well, while they’re at it, maybe the Transportation Ministry should also enforce basic rules on angkots, such as making sure their drivers actually hold the appropriate license (and not be underage) or enforcing penalties on angkots who stop in the middle of the road to drop off or pick up passengers (a practice so common that there’s a local word for it, ngetem).
Nevertheless, this AC requirement, however unlikely it may seem, sounds like a pretty cool idea.
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