The thing about Lampung and it's roads is that it is the path most taken with commerce. Sumatra supplies a large quantity of edibles and raw materials that majorly has to pass through Lampung. Those commodities that come out of Java heading to Sumatra also have to pass through Lampung. Lampung is the route where coming from any direction in Sumatra, all routes come together in Lampung. Like a funnel. Commerce here of course is overloaded trucks. Many of these trucks like to take what they consider short cuts and you find them running around city streets. Maybe since these big trucks are making deliveries to retailers is one of the reasons we have lower prices compared to most of Indonesia. Although I doubt that. Everything seems to be cheaper.
Now add regular traffic going to and from Sumatra. We have a toll road now, maybe 2 years old and it already has problems. It probably isn't used like it should be since the toll from Bandar Lampung to Palembang is close to Rp500,000 each way for cars. It is estimated that this years mudik will have 3.5 million vehicles passing through Bandar Lampung in either direction to mudik and then again after mudik.
The budget Lampung received is high in comparison to other areas and mostly because of these problems. It is not for toll roads or national highways like Sukarno-Hatta highway. They come out of the national budget and are constantly under repair since trucks do not want to pay the tolls. No one can find where these road budgets are being utilized in the regencies. You would never know when driving around. Even city streets have not been repaired in 2 years including high volume larger streets. Large potholes are common place. Well, except near the Governors offices and the City of Bandar Lampung main government building.
Heading West, well, West, then South, then West, then North, then Northwest they have built a nice road from Kota Agung to the West Coast through the mountains. Yes, it us nice and long over due. The old road had holes big and deep enough to fit small cars into. Trucks and buses were heading over the side. Traffic was slow behind any larger vehicle. Now, the road is nice. One would think that new road took care of the problems. Well, it's smooth for now but for some unknown reason the engineers failed to see that the sides of the roads on the higher side and some of the areas on the down slope side are now subject to landslides. Something is constantly sliding down on the road. From a rock to a road covering event, something is happening. Are they addressing these problems? Sure, they have parked dozers so they have access if they are needed. As for actually doing something to fix the problem, no.
While Lampung certainly isn't the only area in Indonesia with infrastructure problems, it is an area where commerce funnels through and both Java and Sumatra businesses are the main cause of road deterioration.
