Writer: Noni Sabandar, Inclusive Urban Planning Associate ITDP Indonesia

Over the past few years, cities in Indonesia have been working towards making their cities more pedestrian and cyclist-friendly. For example, Semarang City has improved pedestrian facilities in commercial and government areas on Jl. Pemuda and Jl. Imam Bonjol in 2021-2022, in downtown Surabaya since 2010, and also Jakarta, which in 2017 massively improved pedestrian and bicycle facilities. Unfortunately, despite these efforts, the issue of inclusivity is still a big homework in its implementation.

Pedestrian infrastructure, such as sidewalks and pedestrian crossings, is often inaccessible to vulnerable groups, especially People with Disabilities. For example, from ITDP, GAUN, and UN Women records, there are still many installations and placements of guideways that do not follow the perspective of blind users, minimum width of pedestrian paths that do not accommodate wheelchair users, slippery pedestrian paths materials, and several other technical errors. This is due to the absence of standards or technical guidelines for the construction of pedestrian facilities that incorporate these inclusivity elements for policymakers in Indonesian cities so that, in practice, pedestrian facilities cause obstacles or are inaccessible to pedestrians with special needs, such as women with children, old persons, children and People with Disabilities.

The Pedestrian Facilities Guidelines in the Circular Letter of the Minister of PUPR No. 2/2018 is the only reference for guidelines in implementing urban pedestrian facilities. However, this guideline has not yet adjusted to the right to disability and inclusivity aspects stated in Law No. 8/2016 on Persons with Disabilities and PM PUPR No. 14/PRT/M/2017. The involvement of vulnerable groups (women, people with disabilities) and community representatives has also not been carried out in preparing regulations.

Description: Bollards that are too close together at waiting for stalls, bus stops that block the entire width of the pedestrian path, pedestrian support facilities in the form of trash bins that are too high, guideways that are more concerned with aesthetics than walking continuity and efficiency (Source: Informative Appendix of Pedestrian Technical Planning Guidelines, 2023).

Seeing this, since 2021, ITDP Indonesia has been working with the National Public Accessibility Movement (GAUN), UN Women Indonesia, and the Ministry of Public Works and Public Housing (PUPR) Directorate General of Highways to review the Technical Guidelines for Pedestrian Facilities that are contained in the Circular Letter (SE) of the Minister of PUPR No. 2 of 2018. This review is an opportunity to improve the Pedestrian Facilities Guidelines by incorporating technical and design standards for pedestrian facilities to make them more sustainable and inclusive.

The main focus of this review of the Pedestrian Facilities Technical Guidelines includes the following:

• Ensuring participatory planning
• Ensuring the fulfilment of aspects of security, comfort, safety, and inclusiveness, especially for vulnerable groups when accessing the city, especially when using pedestrian facilities
• Paying attention to the use of normative references or references based on solid studies, the use of good and correct grammar so that it is easy to read and understand
• Provision of illustrations that help visualise the plan and depict the various users of pedestrian facilities

With this approach, the new Pedestrian Facilities Technical Guidelines are expected to reflect the needs and diversity of vulnerable groups and provide clear and easy-to-understand guidance for all stakeholders related to pedestrian facility planning.

Participatory planning in the development of the guidelines involved forming a task force with each organisation representing a community group; experts, vulnerable groups, women, and government. Weekly task force meetings were organised to discuss each word, sentence, and bullet point in the Pedestrian Facilities Technical Guidelines and align with global technical standards, benchmarking, and field findings.

The results of the task force’s weekly meetings during this year were then presented at the Multi Stakeholders Dialogue (MSD), invited representatives of communities and organisations from 12 Provinces in Indonesia, including; DKI Jakarta, Bali, East Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, Central Sulawesi, North Sulawesi, Central Java, East Java, D.I. Yogyakarta, West Java, Ambon and Papua. In this MSD activity, there were 46 agencies with a total of 63 participants representing 12 Provinces in Indonesia who attended to gather more suggestions and inputs on the draft Technical Guidelines for Pedestrian Facilities that had been reviewed previously by the task force. The agencies involved included disability rights advocacy communities, pedestrian activist communities, children’s discussion forums, women’s rights advocacy organisations, and government agencies. After the MSD, ITDP Indonesia also opened an online form and hotline that can be contacted from April 19, 2022, to May 13, 2022, to get input from both MSD participants and the general public who still want to contribute to reviewing these guidelines.

Picture 6-7. (Left-right) Audience MSD Inclusive Pedestrian Facility Planning Guidelines, MSD Discussion Results

After going through a series of revisions involving ITDP, GAUN, UN Women, and PUPR, as well as the participation of MSD participants and passing the applicable legalisation process, finally, the revised Pedestrian Facilities Technical Guidelines were officially released to the public on May 17, 2023, through 07/P/BM/2023 Pedestrian Facilities Technical Planning Guidelines. With this update, several points were changed and/or added related to:

The effective width of the pedestrian path is 1.85 meters so that it can accommodate the mobility of two wheelchairs passing each other;

• Vehicle entry and exit arrangements that give priority to pedestrians;
• Installation of side and top barrier-free guideways to facilitate navigation for the visually impaired;
• Sloping and easily accessible ramp designs for the wheelchair, stroller, or other wheeled users; and 
• Provision of level and level crossings that are inclusive and safe for all groups.

Related to the issue of women and children being more vulnerable to sexual harassment and violence, the revised guidelines include technical elements to enhance safety when using public facilities previously absent from the Pedestrian Technical Guidelines. The following are some examples of technical aspects to improve safety for women and children that are newly regulated in this revision:

• Improved lighting on pedestrian paths to create a sense of security;
• Installation of CCTV in strategic locations;
• Availability of emergency boxes and panic buttons; and
• In the case of level crossings, sufficient lighting and CCTV are added to ensure the visibility of pedestrians when crossing.

Hopefully, with the update of the Pedestrian Technical Guidelines, there will be a common standard of inclusiveness in building pedestrian facilities in cities in Indonesia. Where pedestrian facilities become safer, more comfortable, and accessible to everyone, including children, reducing the risk of sexual harassment or violence experienced by women when using public facilities.

Read more:

Multi-stakeholder Dialogue Draft Revision of Circular Letter No. 2, 2018 regarding Technical Guidelines for Pedestrian Facilities

Access the Bahasa Indonesia version here.