JAKARTA, May 9 — The Jakarta provincial administration plans to build underground crossing tunnels in several locations in the capital city to ease pedestrian traffic at street crossings, Governor Joko Widodo said today.

“We will build tunnels in three locations. Hopefully, the construction can start within this year,” Indonesia’s Antara news agency quoted the governor as saying.

However, he explained that the work on these underground tunnels will not be completed in a short period of time due to the complexities involved in the construction. He expressed hopes that the new underground crossing tunnels will help in reducing the number of traffic accidents in Jakarta.

Related government officials are still assessing the costs involved in constructing the tunnels.

The plan to build underground crossing tunnels is among the infrastructure projects being planned by the Jakarta government to ease transportation woes in the capital city.

Meanwhile, according to publicly traded construction company PT Adhi Karya Tbk, the construction of Jakarta’s monorail project linking Bekasi-Cawang and Cibubur-Cawang will start in 2015 and is scheduled to be completed by 2017.

Construction of the Jakarta Link Transportation (JLT) will start in April 2015, although it was still waiting for the presidential regulation on monorail.

“With or without the presidential regulation, construction will start in April 2015, and it is to be completed in 2017,” President of the state construction company Kiswodarmawan emphasised after attending a shareholders’ meeting recently.

Kiswodarmawan stressed that the presidential regulation only serves to facilitate “realisation as everything has been prepared.”

Several requirements for the execution of the project, such as the ground plan and draft plan for execution as well as operational right, business license, construction license, and financial closing have been secured, he reiterated.

“All licenses and approvals from the regulators have to be secured the next year,” he added.

He explained that the presidential regulation that is yet to be issued, will serve only as a complement, with the monorail to be built under the Public Private Partnership (PPP) scheme.

“With the approval of the minister of state enterprises, the project can be implemented. This is a fact that we have to do,” he said.

The project is owned by a consortium of four state companies namely PT Industri Kereta Api (INKA), PT Lembaga Elektronika Negara (LEN), PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia (Telkom), and PT Jasa Marga Tbk.

Based on the project master plan, which has been drafted and submitted to the government, the project will cost around Rp8.3 trillion (RM2.3 billion).

“Bank loans make up 70 per cent of the cost with the consortium contributing the remaining 30 per cent in cash,” Kiswodarmawan noted.

The monorail will have at least 10 stations and will be built in areas close to shopping centres, apartments, and office complexes, remarked Pundjung Setya Brata, a senior official of Adhi Karya. — Bernama