"Other big cities in Indonesia also need mass transport systems but they have limited land for such a mode of transportation," President Jokowi stated after inspecting the pace of progress of the MRT project here on Wednesday.
The president said several cities have started to develop mass transportation systems such as Palembang (South Sumatra) which is trying to develop a light carriage or LRT.
"Surabaya (East Java) also did something similar, and has gone in for a tram system," President Jokowi added.
The president stated that he will continue to monitor the progress of the MRT.
"Every day, I am monitoring the construction of the MRT although this is the responsibility of the provincial government of Jakarta," he noted.
Commenting on the drilling process, he said, in the last 93 days, it has reached till 327 meters. The drilling process on this project is expected to be completed by the end of 2016.
"We saw that the Senayan station has already started to take shape and expect other stations to be finished soon," President Jokowi noted.
For the tunnel work at the MRT project, four massive drill engines have been pressed into service. These are Antareja, Antareja II, Mustika Bumi and Mustika Bumi II.
Construction of the underground tunnel with the help of a Japanese Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) began on September 2015 and is expected to be completed in December 2016.
The MRT Jakarta project of south-north corridors first phase (Lebak Bulus-Bundaran Hotel Indonesia) is now 36 percent complete.
The project work on the elevated structures have been completed by 22 percent and underground structures by 50 percent.
In general, the construction work undertaken till date has seen progress on track foundations and elevated stations, construction of the subway box structures, underground tunnel and construction of the MRT depot.(*)
Editor: Heru Purwanto
Copyright © ANTARA 2015
