TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Executive Director of PT KAI Commuter Jabodetabek (KCJ), Muhammad Fadhil, is warning administrators of Jakarta's satellite cities that the perennial traffic congestion experienced across the Greater Jakarta region will only get worse if more flyovers and underpasses are not constructed, especially since the company plans to increase the frequency of train journeys across the Greater Jakarta region - beginning on April 1 - to improve passengers' experiences.

The call was made because the added the frequency of train journeys across and around Greater Jakarta will force traffic to crawl to a halt more often to let the additional trains to pass, especially since almost all railway crossings in the capital are still located above ground and intersect streets - if not, major thoroughfares.

Fadil explained that 784 carriages will be used to run 872 scheduled services every day - up by 15 percent from the total amount of scheduled services in 2014. Under this arrangement, a train set is expected to pass an overpass crossing every five minutes, causing traffic around the crossing to completely stop every five minutes.

"By 2018, we want to make sure that trains throughout our network departs every two minutes, which means that traffic will have to stop more often as more train passes each overground crossing," said Fadli.

PT KCJ's Technical Director, John Roberto, said that the increased frequency will mean that around 800,000 passengers per day could be served - up from its' current capacity of around 700,000 passengers per day.

It is known that PT KCJ has acquired 120 new carriages sourced from Japan, which is due to arrive in June 2015 and will be arranged into 15 train sets, which will be used to run scheduled passenger services from Bekasi, Bogor, Serpong or Maja and Tangerang.

Furthermore, the KCJ's Director of Operation and Marketing, Dwiyana Slamet Riyadi, said that the company has invested around Rp120 billion to acquire 150 more carriages in 2016. "As such we are optimistic that we could serve up to 1.2 million passengers per day by 2018," said Riyadi.

"The trains will come through several batches, so journey frequency will gradually begin to increase," added Roberto.

To prevent their plan from adding to Jakarta's traffic woes , PT KCJ is planning to meet with Jakarta's administrators to discuss the possibility of building more underpasses and/or flyovers at major junctions and thoroughfares, which will allow motorist to travel without having to stop every time a train passes the area.

The Jakarta's Head of Highways Agency, Yusmada Faizal, said that to anticipate the increased frequency, his officials have proposed the construction of several flyovers which will not intersect the train tracks. "We have discussed and proposed this idea, but we do not know whether the budget for such has been approved by our city councillors (DPRD)," add Faizal to Tempo.

DIMAS SIREGAR | MAYA NAWANGWULAN