The Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) trial done along Jalan Jenderal Sudirman, Central Jakarta, Tuesday (7/15), was causing traffic congestion in some alternative routes.

It is indeed reducing traffic congestion on Jalan Sudirman. However, the congestion moves to other locations because unregistered vehicles choose to pass on alternative routes

“With ERP implementation, it is automatically only vehicles that paid enter Jalan Jenderal Sudirman. So, many vehicles avoid that road and pass on alternative roads. From our monitoring, there are five roads which traffic became increasingly congested after the ERP implemented. Those roads are Jalan KH Mas Mansyur, Jalan HR Rasuna Said, Jalan Asia Afrika, Jalan Gatot Subroto, and Jalan Tanah Abang,” stated City Police Traffic Directorate Operational Section Chief AKBP Budiyanto, Wednesday (7/16).

Because of that, if ERP really was implemented in January next year, Budiyanto predicts it would only reduce traffic congestion on Jalan Jenderal Sudirman-Jalan MH Thamrin.

“It is indeed reducing traffic congestion on Jalan Sudirman. However, the congestion moves to other locations because unregistered vehicles choose to pass on alternative routes,” he said.

As previously reported, ERP trial is done to know whether the ERP gate detection device and the On Board Unit (OBU), the device installed on vehicles, functioning or not. The gate is seven meters high and 14 meters wide, which is equipped with sophisticated machines. The ERP system itself is implemented along Jalan Jenderal Sudirman starting from in front of Panin Bank building.

The trial is also done to know the connection between ERP’s hardware and software. For initial phase, the trial is implemented along slow lane of Jalan Jenderal Sudirman until Jakarta Kota where there is only one gate installed for now. After the trial period, it is scheduled that every vehicle passing on ERP gate will be charged for about Rp 30 thousand. There are about 40 ERP gates to be installed later.