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Commuters riding on the roofs of trains are not an uncommon sight in Jakarta, and many desperate to get to their destination clamber up top when seats aren’t available. The roof also provides a free of charge route to those who aren’t willing to cough up the price of a ticket.
Not for long, however. Reuters is reporting that, after years of neglected pleas to avoid roof riding, Indonesia’s state owned railway company P T Kereta Api has announced a plan that will catch roof riders red handed – or yellow or blue. Commuters on the roof will be sprayed with a colored liquid, so they are easily identifiable when they arrive at their station. Wearing colored proof of their crimes, these vagrants will then be made to buy a ticket, and their ID’s will be confiscated.
As if getting doused in paint in public wasn’t humiliating enough, copies of the ticket will be mailed to the person’s employer and home, and in the case of errant students, to their headmaster.
The country’s electric train system is overworked, overcrowded and far from affordable. It’s also a dangerous mode of transport — 53 roof riders have been killed in the past two years alone.