Police have observed that outbound traffic from Jakarta is heaviest from dusk to midnight as more people leave the capital to celebrate Idul Fitri in their hometown.

Insp. General Firman Shantyabudi said the police needed to make adjustments to the one-way traffic management strategy to comply with traffic patterns.

To ease severe traffic jams, police enforced a one-way traffic system from Cikampek in West Java to Kalikangkung in Central Java on the Trans-Java Toll Road during the holiday season. The toll road section is the main passage for people heading east from Jakarta to Central Java, Yogyakarta and East Java.

Firman said the one-way system, initially in place from 5 p.m. to midnight, had been extended to 8 a.m.

“With the numbers we’ve seen, we’re trying to adapt to traveler trends,” the official said, as quoted by Tempo.

Firman is calling on home travelers to follow police guidelines. People heading west on the Trans-Java Toll Road are advised to do so from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Authorities expected the peak of mudik (exodus) of traffic to take place on Friday, the first day of the collective national holiday. The government has declared May 2 and 3 as national Idul Fitri holidays, alongside mandatory collective holidays on Fridays and May 4-6.

The Ministry of Transport has predicted that 85 million people will travel to Idul Fitri this year as pandemic restrictions ease. Around 14 million people will set off from the Jakarta metropolitan area alone, braving hours of traffic to celebrate the end of Ramadan with their families. (dre)