BIG FISH VERSUS SMALL FISH IN KAPUAS RIVER TRANSPORTATION

Through many years, people have been living with a lot of development in transportation element. In past, people used to walk to travel from one place to another. Then people develop a vehicle to reach far places called bicycle. After many years, as human nature, people become not satisfied with bicycle. They begin to develop another vehicles start with motorcycle, car, ship, and plane. Nowadays, people can travel to farther places without wasting their time. In our country Indonesia, there is an island with the longest river, the island is Borneo and the river located in West Borneo. The river name is Kapuas River. People in West Borneo prefer to use ship rather than car or motorcycle. Capital city of West Borneo is Pontianak. Pontianak city is divided by Kapuas River.

There are two alternative ways to across Kapuas River. First, they can across using bridges and another is across the river itself. Pontianak people usually use water transportation. There are 2 famous water transportations in Pontianak city. The common water transports are ferry boat and motor boat. These two water vehicle can deliver people across river. Though these two water vehicles have similarity but they also have some differences. Differences among these two water vehicles are charge of the money, service, and capacity.

            These two water vehicle take money from the people who use their service, but they do not charge in the same price. The charge for one time ferry boat across is Rp 1,000 for each person. It is the same charge that used by motor-boat for one time across. There are differences of the charge to across land using vehicle like motorcycle. The charge used by ferry boat to across the river for a motorcycle is Rp 2,000. Meanwhile, the charge that used by motor-boat to across a motor bike is more or less about Rp 5000.

            When use these two water vehicle across the Kapuas River, the passengers can enjoys some services. The services which are given by the owner or the company of these two water vehicle are different one to another. The services that available in motor-boat are there is no roof, the entire passenger can sit, and the passengers don’t need spend too much time until the departure. The services which are available in ferry-boat are the roofs that protect the passenger from the sunlight and rain, there is a few of chair, and the time that the passenger spend from the arrival of ferry boat until the departure is about 10 minutes.

            In addition, these two water vehicles give service to people to across the Kapuas River without spending too much time. These two water vehicles also have different in the capacity that can they load. In Pontianak city, there is only one unit of ferry-boat that service to across Kapuas River. Eventhough, there is only one unit of ferry boat available, but the ferry itself have big capacity to load many passengers who wants to across the Kapuas river. While, the motor boat have smaller capacity, therefore, the motor boat cannot load too much passenger to across the Kapuas river in once. Eventhough the motor boat only have small capacity but there are a lot of motor boat unit in Pontianak city especially along Kapuas river in Pontianak.

            Human have been able to travel to many places by using many vehicle through the years. The vehicle itself has provided become new and different vehicle to satisfied human desire to travel to many places. While there are many different vehicles that can satisfy people desire to travel to many places, the people itself should understand carefully to drive their vehicle if that is a private own. The people also should give attention when choose public transportation before use their services.