Wahyu Aji Syahputra, a student of the Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Indonesia (FTUI) 2019, earned Second Place in the Civil Engineering Insight and Creation Competition (CESTION), owing the award to his proposal for construction of transport infrastructure in Disadvantaged, Frontier, and Outlying (DFO/3T) Areas of Indonesia. CESTION is an essay writing and road modeling comptetition held by Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM) as a part of the Civil in Action series of events. CESTION was held in May and attended by several universities in Indonesia, including UI, UNS, ITS, UGM, ITB, ITK, UNDIP, UPN Veteran Jawa Timur, and others.
“In the essay I presented, I proposed a solution that can be applied to the development of transport infrastructure in indonesia’s 3T areas. As the object of my case study I chose Elpaputih Subdistrict, Maluku, a place with an inadequate transportation system and road condition. This is very unfortunate; the area has a very abundant supply of forest and marine natural resources. Transportation planning in the area would help the community carry out their activities, especially those related to the local economy.”
The main natural commodities to be found in Elpaputih come in the form of marine and forest products. Elpaputih’s tree farm produces meranti (Dipterocarpoideae shorea) wood, gopassa (Vitex cofassus), ironwood (Eusideroxylon zwageri), ebony, teak, sandalwood, resin, rattan, eucalyptus and various species of orchids. Facing Elpaputih is the Bay of Elpaputih and Banda Sea, from which groupers, baronangs, tiger shrimp, white shrimp, sea cucumbers, and seaweed are obtained. The lack of an adequate transport system, however, poses a challenge for residents of Elpaputih wishing to sell their products to other parts of Indonesia or abroad. The road model designed by Wahyu Aji proposes to solve this problem. “The [proposed] road modeling for [Elpaputih’s] transport system is designed by taking into account geographical conditions in Elpaputih, which has quite large forest plots and extreme terrain, requiring a suitable special construction method. The road model that I designed consists of four traces. Each trace has differing lengths, adjusting to on-site conditions. The total length of the traces is 4.37 km,”
Each route was determined and designed by taking into consideration land contour, elevation, and forest land use so as not to require any act of eviction in the construction of the road. Some of the routes will assume a horizontal alignment; others a vertical one. In order to optimise traffic through the area, a two-way traffic system will be implemented.
Faculty of Engineering Dean, Prof. Dr. Heri Hermansyah, ST., M.Eng., IPU, hopes that Wahyu Aji’s designs can be implemented in Elpaputih and make a positive impact on the district and its residents.
“These positive impacts not only take the form of improvement in the economy,” Prof. Heri said. “Road modelling also provides excellent benefits and contributes to the environment and a better regional spatial plan. Moreover, this construction also fulfills several criteria for sustainable development, namely ease of transport (transit), variation in land use (mix), density between buildings (densify), no vacant land (compact), and ease of transfer between modes. (shifts).” Wahyu Aji’s designs make use of Building Information Modelling (BIM), an integrated digital system containing many sorts of information on construction. BIM has seen use in construction design.
