Economy

Getting around in Indonesia: trains, planes, bemos, buses, kecaks, and ferries

I posted this video online five years ago to highlight the often chaotic world of public transportation in Indonesia. As worried as I was about the large number of jet crashes and ferry sinkings there, the hazards of riding local public transportation gave me more concern. And, these concerns are well-justified.

Road injuries are ranked 10th of all contributors to the global burden of disease–more so in developing nations. In Indonesia, approximately 49,000 people die annually on the roads. Having seen in person several fatal road accidents there, usually involving small motorcycles and larger vehicles, I can say unequivocally that these are horrific ways to die. In fact, the United States Department of State offers this warning to would-be American visitors to my very much beloved Indonesia: “Air, ferry, and road accidents resulting in fatalities, injuries, and significant damage are common. … While all forms of transportation are ostensibly regulated in Indonesia, oversight is spotty, equipment tends to be less well maintained than that operated in the United States, amenities do not typically meet Western standards, and rescue/emergency response is notably lacking.”

However, it is cheap to move around. Train travel was super easy, as was hopping on a bus, or the smaller bemos. I just would not advise getting in a taxi late at night during the seasonal typhoons and have the driver then tell you that his headlights are not working, in broken English, as you navigate back roads in a city you know nothing about. Ah, the memories of travel. Priceless.

By all means, please do visit Indonesia, support the local businesses there with your money, and use a bit of common sense. Or your can stay at home, thinking you are safe and cozy, and never really understand how things work in places as dynamic and important as the largest Moslem-majority country in the entire world. For that is what corporate greenwashing campaigns like the Rainforest Alliance’s Follow the Frog want us to do: never ever leave home and never ever learn about the world first-hand. The choice is truly yours. I say, be curious, be friendly, and definitely be mobile.

See my picture gallery of Indonesia photos on my web site. (Ed. Note: I legally changed my name to Rudy Owens from Rudy Brueggemann after I had produced this film, so that is why you will see that name on the video.)

Rural King County, Auburn to Enumclaw

 

Taken June 2014.
Taken June 2014.
Taken June 2014.
Taken June 2014

I live in King County, the most populous in Washington state, home to Microsoft, Amazon, Boeing, and other major global corporations. Billionaires by the bushel live here, and private wealth abounds. But there is also another King County, just outside those urban areas and in semi-rural communities that are unincorporated. The bustle of Seattle is not found here. In fact in some places, it is quite the opposite. Here are a few scenes on Highway 164, on a drive from the city of Auburn to the city of Enumclaw.

Public, you are not invited to the port
This is a shot of the cargo container yard at the Port of Seattle, from behind the protective razor wire that surrounds miles of land off-limits to anyone but companies who use the port, employees, unions like Teamsters who run the unloading of goods, security teams, and those working on the ships and planes that come and go (2014).

 

Port authorities, as quasi-public entities, with minimal and almost no public oversight, amaze me with the scope of their power and the size of their land holdings. The Port of the Seattle is the largest property owner in the city. It runs an international airport and one of the country’s largest cargo container ports. Yet almost none of the city’s 600,000 or so residents have the slightest idea what happens behind the razor wire fences. Mainly all of those low-cost Asian-made goods come in, and some of our heavy materials, industrial goods, and agricultural goodies go out. I cannot fault any authority for maintaining security, but is this management structure more about protecting the interests of the large corporations that utilize these public resources for their business models or about keeping our commercial sector safe from “bad guys.” And have no doubt, bad guys do use this port to smuggle everything, from illegal drugs to people. They are like a big no-go zone that everyone agrees is good for all of us. That remains the weird part. Who decided all of this, and who benefits from all of this? (The port would say, I do, with cheap goods and a strong economy, I know.)

Looking down into the Red Dog Mine
The zinc and lead mine about 50 miles from the Chukchi sea is among the largest of its kind in the world. This picture was taken in 2008.
The Red Dog Mine is the largest mine in Alaska and has been at the center of a dispute for years, but production continues, and the market demand never tires of its metals.

The Red Dog Mine, in Alaska’s Northwest Arctic Borough, is one of the world’s largest zinc and lead mines. It is owned and operated by Canada-based Teck Resources Ltd., one of Canada’s largest mine companies, which itself is now partially owned (17.5%) by the Chinese sovereign wealth fund called China Investment Corp. Teck partners with NANA, the Alaska Native Regional Corp., which provided rights to the land. The mine provides jobs to a remote and landlocked area with little or no economy outside of health care and government. Teck touts its 500 plus jobs and economic benefits for the region and local residents, though it is a major polluter, and the mine’s discharge of wastewater has been at the center of a years-long battle with residents of a small coastal village called Kivalina.

I visited Red Dog in 2008. It is an impressive site. I also have met some of the opponents of the mine. There are no easy answers here. I wrote a paper on the mine and examined its health impacts, and my paper largely agreed with a study done for the permitting (not enforceable) that the mine actually provides net health benefits to the region, such as good jobs and a stable economy, despite its other health impacts. Mining is not clean or simple, and the global economic system is dependent on it. Here is how the mine looked in 2008, prior to an application that sought to expand it, with the Aqqaluk proposal, which is basically an expanded mine of the current project. (And for the record, I am opposed to the planned Pebble Mine; I am not an advocate of party line thinking.)

Port’s eye view of Seattle
Seattle’s skyline is seen from the Port of Seattle, south of downtown (2014).

The Port of Seattle is the biggest landholder in Seattle, and it occupies miles of land along reclaimed tidal areas. This is a view looking toward downtown Seattle from the southern end of the cargo container port berths. (Click on the photo for a larger image on a separate picture page.)

Oil trains picking up steam in Seattle
Seattle’s pass through rail traffic includes petroleum and chemical products shipped through the BNSF rail hubs in the city. Photo taken April 26, 2014.
Petroleum cars can hold up to 30,000 gallons each (2014).

The expansion of oil production in North Dakota’s Bakken oil fields is also pushing petroleum to Northwest refineries and planned refineries, including in Anacortes and further north in Whatcom County at Cherry Point. Seattle, a major rail hub of the BNSF Railway Co., already has long lines of trains carrying petroleum and other products like ethanol. Some Washington state politicians and activists have expressed concern, in light of oil train derailments and fatal explosions in  the last two years in Lac Megantic, Quebec, and Casselton, N.D. BNSF reports that about 1.5 trains carrying more than 90 cars, each capable of carrying 30,000 gallons of unrefined, light crude oil, pass through the Pacific Northwest every day. I have seen them in a rail yard about 1.5 miles from my house, in a spot called Interbay. One thing I also know, this country and this region’s appetite for petroleum shows no sign of slowing down, and the state is looking to expand its refining capacity. Expect big fights in the months and years ahead among the competing interest groups. (Click on the images for a larger picture on a separate picture page.)

Ash Grove Cement, a Seattle landmark
This shot was taken in April 2014.

Every work day I pass by the enormous cement factory and kilns of the Ash Grove Cement Co., just west of Highway 99. You can’t miss the factory and its two enormous kilns. The facility, owned by a Kansas-based firm of the same name, is as much a Seattle landmark in my eyes as the more famous Space Needle. I finally took a bike trip there this weekend and snapped a few pictures. I love the designs of industrial facilities and how function dictates form.

Port of Seattle shipping, it never, ever stops

 

About 70 percent of the U.S. economy is driven by consumer spending. That really means, because we shop, our economic boat stays afloat. But what does that mean outside of the discount and electronics goods shopping stores? It means large ports processing containers filled with goods manufactured in Asia for the North American and U.S. market. This particular Maersk Line cargo ship, the Axel Maersk, stacks containers eight high, and its control room stands even higher. Here are different angles on the Axel Maersk, unloading its cargo today at the Port of Seattle (April 26, 2014). The ship can reportedly carry up to 9,000 containers at one time. (Click on each photo to be taken to a separate photo page with a larger image.)

The Pebble Mine area, what ground zero of a resource war looks like
A work site at the planned, and now stalled, Pebble mine area (2005).
Drill pads were scattered over the prospective site, where samples were taken for further lab analysis (2005).
Helicopters are the primary way crews are able to explore the remote work site where Pebble is located, upstream from Lake Iliamna and Bristol Bay (2005)
One of several drill sites in the area of the planned Pebble mine (2005).
Geologists take core samples to determine the mineral prospects of areas to determine the feasibility of developing areas; these are from the Pebble site (2005).

During my six years in Alaska from 2004 through 2010, by far the most protracted and controversial of many simmering resource development battles was the fight over the so-called Pebble Mine. This area is upriver from Lake Iliamna, a short plane ride west of Anchorage. The proposed copper and molybdenum mine is touted as holding some of the world’s largest deposits of copper. But building it would also create a massive open pit operation in the headwaters to one of the world’s most productive sockeye fish hatcheries, and were a spill to occur, the consequences would likely be devastating to the fishery. The battle was heated, dividing even mostly resource-friendly Republicans like former Sen. Ted Stevens (who spoke out against it during my time there), mainly because of the incredibly rich fishing resources downstream that provided good jobs to many Native communities with a renewable resource (tasty sockeye salmon).

I will not get into the debate, which embraced the vitriol and emotion I associated with the “War on Terror” and the “with us or against us” mentality that coincided during my years in Alaska. Regardless of what I say, this project has seen two of the world’s largest mining companies, Anglo American and Rio Tinto, walk away from their stakes during the last year, leaving the remaining company called Pebble Partnership high and dry, without the major financial backing it needs to pull this off. I think the science strongly shows this is not the place to build such a huge mine. Regardless of my opinion, without big money, big mines cannot be developed. And the U.S. EPA is against it. These pictures were taken during my site visit there in 2005, when I worked in Anchorage. I hope these pictures provide a window into one of the hottest battles ever seen in the 49th state. (Note, all pictures were taken with my consumer-grade Canon digital camera–not bad for the tough little workhorse.)

Port of Tacoma, the old and new economy
The Port of Tacoma hums with activity on a sunny winter’s morning (2014).

Every work day I drive past the bustling port of Tacoma, hub of global commerce and home to heavy industry. It is blue-collar to the core, and unashamedly so. (I always wonder what kinds of organized crime take place here–my bet is quite a lot.) I also find the port to be one of the most fascinating manmade landscapes in the Northwest. I have started a series of photographs that I am calling Manufactured Landscapes. Here is one in black and white that I published on my web site in color. I like it in both color and black and white. This was taken from downtown Tacoma, looking east upon the port, where you can get a visual sampling of some of the major industry players that call it home.