Indonesia is launching the first high-speed rail service in Southeast Asia, which will reduce the current three-hour travel time between cities to roughly forty minutes.
Part of China's Belt and Road program, the railway connects the Indonesian capital of Jakarta with Bandung, the densely populated capital of West Java state.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo stopped by one of the four stations along the Jakarta-Bandung section of the railway on Thursday. There, he saw eight completed train cars and an inspection train that had arrived from China in early September.
Widodo told reporters that the high-speed rail between Jakarta and Bandung will increase the country's competitiveness and make it easier to move people and commodities quickly.
Widodo believed that the economy as a whole will improve thanks to the bullet train.
After the Group of 20 meeting next month in Bali, it was previously reported that Widodo will ask his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping to travel on the China-made bullet train. Widodo told reporters on Thursday that the idea "is still not finished yet" since he and Xi are still discussing it.
The CRRC Qingdao Sifang railway firm in China is responsible for the design and construction of the railcars. CRRC's first high-speed train export was delivered in September, and it consisted of ten KCIC400AF eight-car trains and one KCIC400AF-CIT inspection train. In April of 2017, CRRC was given a contract for $364.5 million.
Disputes over land purchases and environmental concerns have pushed up the opening of the newly built train line from 2019 to June 2023. Construction on the project began in 2016.
PT Kereta Cepat Indonesia-China, or PT KCIC, is a joint venture between an Indonesian consortium of four state-owned firms and China Railway International Co. Ltd. They are building a 142.3-kilometer (88.4-mile) railway at a cost of $7.8 billion. In a joint statement, the companies claimed their trains will set a new speed record in the region.
Powered by electric motors with a combined 625,000 watts of electricity, the CRRC claims the KCIC400AF train can travel at speeds of up to 350 kilometers per hour (217 miles per hour). There will be special VIP cars, regular first- and second-class cars, and numerous vehicles with extra-wide aisles for passengers with mobility issues.
The company claims they have made special adjustments so the trains can withstand the heat and humidity of Indonesia, and that they have a more robust security system that can monitor for natural disasters like earthquakes and floods. The 208.9-meter-long train consists of eight cars (685.3 feet).
In October 2015, Indonesia chose China over Japan in a competitive bidding process for a rail contract that would be financed in large part by a loan from the China Development Bank. Twenty-five percent comes from the consortium's own resources.
The high-speed rail line would stretch through four provinces on Java's main island and terminate in Surabaya, the country's second-largest city.
Widodo won a second term in 2019 thanks to support for his hallmark program, which was to enhance the country's infrastructure.
The Jakarta Subway, a project funded by Japan, opened in 2019 as part of the city's plan to reduce traffic congestion. According to Budi Karya Sumadi, the minister of transportation, the second phase of the project is nearly finished, and the United Kingdom and Japan have offered the nation soft loans for the third phase.
Light-rail transport services have been completed by the government in Palembang and Jakarta, and five other cities, including the popular tourist destination of Bali, are planning to implement LRT in the near future.
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