Jakarta-Bandung Fast Train Project Backtrack, Operational in 2021
3 May 2018 10:28 WIB
TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Coordinating Minister of Maritime Affairs Luhut Binsar Pandkaitan has met with China Railway Corporation (CRC) President Lu Dongfu yesterday to discuss the continuation of the Jakarta-Bandung fast train.
According to the Ministry’s Infrastructure Coordinator Deputy III Ridwan Djamaluddin, the meeting mostly discussed on existing matters such as; “Permits and land spaces,” he said on Wednesday, May 2.
Ridwan said that the meeting discussed upon the project’s completion deadline and CRC also promised to provide the best technology, contractor, and Indonesian work force to handle the project.
“Lu Dongfu said that the construction would need three years to complete if issues related to land availability is completed,” according to Ridwan.
The Jakarta-Bandung fast-train was originally planned to be completed by the year 2019 but has now backpedalled to the year 2020 following land acquirement that have yet been completed since 2016.
In a separate occasion, State-Owned Enterprises Ministry Rini Soemarno said that the Jakarta-Bandung fast-train is set to be fully operable by March 2021. She hopes that 22 land acquirement would be completed by May 7, 2018.
Furthermore, the project’s land acquirement has only been 64.2 percent completed.
The 142 kilometer Jakarta-Bandung railway is one of President Jokowi’s infrastructure construction plans that will connect the Halim Perdanakusuma Station in East Jakarta to the Tegalluar Station in Bandung, West Java. The project hopes to slash the travel time of the fast train between both regions down to merely 40 minutes.
M YUSUF MANURUNG
