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No New Licenses for Billboards Following Collapses in Jakarta
Dofa Fasila | January 10, 2012

A billboard covers a truck after powerful winds caused it to collapse on Jalan Arjuna Selatan in West Jakarta on Thursday. The sudden storm flooded streets, damaged buildings, caused rush-hour traffic to grind to a halt and left one man dead. (Suara Pembaruan Photo/Joanito De Saojoao) A billboard covers a truck after powerful winds caused it to collapse on Jalan Arjuna Selatan in West Jakarta on Thursday. The sudden storm flooded streets, damaged buildings, caused rush-hour traffic to grind to a halt and left one man dead. (Suara Pembaruan Photo/Joanito De Saojoao)
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DrDez
5:14pm Jan 11, 2012

what about new bridge licences? Or schools? They tend to collapse without extreme weather


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The Jakarta government will temporarily stop issuing licenses for new billboards after six of them collapsed last week when storms hit the capital, an official said.

“There will be no new permits. If there are new permit requests I won’t sign them, we will evaluate first,” said Wiriyatmoko, chief of the city’s Supervision and Enforcement Agency (P2B).

Wiriyatmoko did not say when the government would again issue permits for new billboards.

Jakarta Governor Fauzi Bowo on Monday inspected billboards across the capital and said some were not structurally sound.

Jakarta’s administration operates 160 billboards across the city, while private companies own at least 800 billboards in the capital.

Wiriyatmoko added that an evaluation on the advertisements’ construction should be completed by July.

“Sometimes these billboard companies construct their advertisements carelessly. They often violate existing regulations,” he said.

Wiriyatmoko said he would order companies to reinforce their billboards’ and that those considered serious threats to public safety would be dismantled.

The heavy rains and strong winds that struck Jakarta last week were estimated to have caused Rp 270 billion ($29.7 million) in damage to vehicles and lost earnings, city officials said.

A pickup truck was crushed by a falling billboard in Tomang, West Jakarta, that also brought down an electric pole. The driver was electrocuted.

Wiriyatmoko said he was investigating the company that owns the Tomang billboard.

“The billboard owner has an obligation to compensate losses. If the company is giving a hard time to the victims just tell me, I will revoke their licenses,” he said.

The government, he said, is also considering requiring all billboards across Jakarta to be self-powered.

Today, nearly all billboards use electricity from the city’s power grid which makes them an electrocution hazard and a cause of power outages if the billboard collapses.

The Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) warned of light to medium rains that could continue hitting the city in the next few days. There was also a high possibility of strong winds, it said.

The Jakarta Disaster Mitigation Agency (BPBD) said more than 26,500 officials had been deployed in anticipation of upcoming floods. That figure did not include police and military officers, it added.

The government has asked six district hospitals and 105 private hospitals to accept possible flood victims. It has also set up emergency shelters in 62 wards across the capital that are prone to annual flooding.