Indonesia to deploy skating police officers to overcome traffic jams
JAKARTA - INDONESIA is rolling out a new weapon in its battle against gridlock: traffic police on inline skates.
The idea is that officers will be able to reach traffic jams in the capital Jakarta quicker than by car or motorbike, the Koran Tempo daily reported. Once there, they will be able to direct vehicles to get the city's traffic flow moving again.
The city's top traffic cop Dua Sutirto said the force had hired a professional inline skater to teach the team of 20 officers before it is deployed on July 1.
'Most of the men are young and fast,' Mr Sutirto was quoted as saying.
Jakarta suffers from some of the worst traffic jams in Asia and it remains to be seen what effect - if any - the inline skating police team will have on the problem.
Jakarta is slowly rolling out a network of dedicated bus lanes, but it is still desperately short of buses, while attempts to enforce car-pooling have been ineffective.
Traffic police in Jakarta have a reputation for laziness and often demand bribes from motorists to ignore minor or imaginary violations. The city's 12 million residents generally hold them in low regard. -- AP
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