New town development in Jakarta Metropolitan Region: a perspective of spatial segregation

The extent to which land and new town development has reinforced spatial segregation in Jakarta Metropolitan Region (JMR) is discussed. The demand for new towns has been essentially generated by the need for security and fulfilling an exclusive life style, which because it is innovative, has been able to sell an image of the ‘new town’ as a symbol of ‘modernism.’ New town development has reinforced spatial segregation in three ways: First, it has polarized the middle and upper income groups, resulting in scattered pockets of exclusive residential areas. Second, within the new towns themselves, the upper middle and high class occupied exclusively designed areas with the highest security possible. Third, in several new towns, urban development management is carried out by the developers instead of by the city hall. The spatial segregation in JMR can be classified as ‘self segregation’ or ‘voluntary segregation.’ It will continue and is inevitable, a result of socio-economic and political conditions within the urban society as a whole.