"The ticket on the Jakarta-Padang route costs Rp1,476,000. Land transportation can revive again," Syukur remarked in Padang on Tuesday.
The Organda chairman noted that when the price of flight tickets was low, at Rp500 thousand for a one-way ticket, the demand for modes of land transportation among passengers had dropped, as the high operational costs had to be borne while the number of passengers was not high.
The difference in ticket prices is not the main deciding factor for people to opt for flights, but it is the less travel time of merely 1.5 hours than a bus journey that can take some 30 hours.
However, since the end of December 2018, the price of flight tickets had increased, thereby resulting in the community pondering over using air transportation modes and again looking at land transportation.
The number of bus passengers has increased significantly by two to three folds, so land transportation entrepreneurs have again mustered the courage to re-invest to revamp their fleet to offer greater comfort to passengers in keeping with their demands.
"Travelling by super executive class is very convenient. On an average, buses come equipped with toilets, so they do not need to often make stopovers," he pointed out.
The tariff is also quite competitive, at Rp500 thousand each way, so it does not overly burden the community.
Earlier, the transportation ministry had issued Minister of Transportation Decree No. 106 of 2019 on the Upper Tariff Limit of Domestic Class Scheduled Commercial Air Transport Service Passengers, urging airlines to reduce the upper limit rate of 12-16 percent.
EDITED BY INE
Translator: Eliswan Azly
Editor: Fardah Assegaf
Copyright © ANTARA 2019
